Frequently Asked Questions: Math
Emporium Courses at Olympic College
Welcome to your Math Emporium Course! Below are the answers to several commonly-asked questions regarding
Math Emporium. If you have additional questions, please see your instructor.
Do I Have to Attend Class?
YES! Students who attend their Math Emporium class regularly are more likely to be successful in the class than
those working from home. A portion of your grade is based on attendance.
Help! I Can’t Click on My Pie!
There are several screens in ALEKS from which you cannot directly access your pie. If you are in the middle of an
assessment, you must complete the assessment before accessing learning mode (your pie) again.
If you are not in an assessment, then you must exit the area you are in before accessing your pie. Scroll to the
bottom of the screen and click on “Done” and/or “Next” in order to return to learning mode.
Where is My Homework?
Click on “Assignments” in the ribbon to access your homework. The Assignments area contains two tabs:
“Assignments” and “Assignment Results” as seen in the screenshot below.
Use the “Assignments” tab to complete your homework or reattempt assignments, if allowed in your class. (Check
the syllabus to determine how many attempts you are allowed for each homework assignment.) The
“Assignments” tab does not indicate your score or whether you have completed an assignment.
Use the “Assignment Results” tab to see your scores and the number of attempts you have already taken on each
homework assignment. The grades for Scheduled Assessments are shown in the gradebook and may be listed as
N/A. When in doubt, check the gradebook.
More on Homework
You may be required to write out your homework problems and solutions to be turned in for credit. Please check
your syllabus to determine whether your written work will be graded.
Help! I Didn’t Complete an Objective On-Time and Now I Can’t Access It!
Please pay very close attention to due dates for objectives. Once a due date has passed, you will not be
able to click on most (possibly all) the topics you were working on until the end of the quarter or you are
caught up in the current objective. This is so you do not get too far behind and you can pass the class.
Rest assured that if mastery of a topic from a closed objective is needed in order to understand a current topic, the
topic from the closed objective will become available to you. Furthermore, after the last objective due date for the
course has passed, the entire pie will become available for you to learn and review for your final assessment.
Why Did ALEKS Give Me Another Assessment?
ALEKS periodically gives Automatic Assessments to determine any topics that you need to relearn and allow you to
skip over any more advanced topics that you now know. You always will receive an Automatic Assessment any time
you complete an objective. It is important that you take these assessments seriously because they will determine
what you will be given an opportunity to learn.
More on Assessments
You may complete Automatic Assessments anywhere, but the Scheduled Assessments must be taken in class. If you
receive testing accommodations through Access Services, please make appointments with the testing center for
Scheduled Assessments.
While taking an assessment of any kind, ALEKS will not allow you to access your pie or review topics.
Only use the ALEKS calculator which is available to you only on problems where calculators are allowed.
After you complete an assessment, ALEKS shows you your new Pie based on your performance on that assessment.
Even if an assessment removes topics from your Pie in an objective that you had previously completed, that
objective grade will not change in your gradebook.
If it has been a while since your last assessment or you just want extra practice, you may ask your instructor to
activate an assessment for you.
My Financial Aid Code is Expiring! How do I Extend Access?
Log in to ALEKS, but do not click on your course. Instead, click on “Actions”.
Your Course
A dropdown menu should appear; select “Extend access to this class”. If your access has expired already, select the
option “Renew access to this class”.
Option 1: If you have purchased a code already, you may enter that code in the next screen and then hit submit.
Your Expiration Date in ALEKS should change to a date after the end of the term.
Option 2: If you have not yet purchased a code, you may use a credit card to extend your access online. Students
generally find the lowest price by purchasing access directly from ALEKS in this way.
1.
Click on “purchase an access code online” as shown in the screenshot below.
2.
Select the option you would like to purchase. Students who plan to take another emporium math
class should consider purchasing a 4-quarter code because it is the same price as two quarters and
can be used for all ALEKS-based (Emporium) mathematics classes, including the open Preview/Review
courses that are very helpful for studying between terms.
Enter your billing information and follow the online instructions to complete your registration.
3.
How Do I Check that I Spent Enough Time in ALEKS This Week?
ALEKS keeps track of the amount of time you spend working in the system. Your instructor uses this tracking to
record your weekly “Hours in ALEKS” score in the gradebook. It is important to monitor your own time in order to
ensure that you receive these points. To check your hours, do the following.
1.
Click on “Report” at the top of the screen.
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You should see three tabbed sections: “Pie Report”, “Common Core Standards”, and “Time and Topic”.
Select the “Time and Topic” tab.
Click on “Change Date Range” as seen in the screenshot below.
Set the begin date to Monday of the appropriate week and the end date to the following Sunday and hit
“Compute”.
If the “Total for this period” is less than the required amount (found in your syllabus), spend some more
time working in ALEKS and then re-check your hours.
More on Hours in ALEKS
Please note that hours do not “roll over”. It is important that you spend at least the minimum amount of time
working on math every week. You will learn best by spending just a few hours in ALEKS several days each week as
opposed to many hours on one or two days.
ALEKS Wants Me to Review; Do I have to Review?
When logging into the ALEKS system, you may be given a list of topics to review. It is a good idea to spend some
time reviewing topics at the beginning of each ALEKS session to ensure that you retain what you have learned, but
it is not required. If the due date for an objective you have not yet mastered is close, you should spend as much
time as possible learning those topics while they are available to you and then review later.
In the days before a Scheduled Assessment, clicking on these review topics will help you to study.
I’m Almost Done with My Pie; Now What?
Congratulations! You are almost ready to be moved into the next course level. Here are the next steps.
1.
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5.
Complete 100% of your ALEKS pie.
Complete all of your homework.
Take a practice final assessment.
Take a proctored final assessment and achieve an appropriate score. (See your instructor for the minimum
score.)
The instructor will help you transfer to the next ALEKS course.
More on Early Course Completion
You will continue to attend the same class with the same instructor for the remainder of the quarter. The instructor
and TA will continue to help you with the new class.
Your transcript will indicate the highest course (up to Math 99) that you complete.
You may work on precalculus in ALEKS to prepare for Math& 141, but you cannot earn credit for work beyond the
Math 99 level.
I Started the Next Course Level but Didn’t Complete It; Did I Waste My Time?
No, you have saved yourself quite a bit of time! Any topics you master now will be topics that you may skip in your
next emporium course. However, you do need to retain that mastery into the next term. In this way, many
students complete three courses over a span of two quarters.
After the term ends, you may transfer to a Preview/Review course and continue to work over the break to save
even more time. Your instructor has more information about Preview/Review courses.
Help! I Forgot My Username or Password!
If you forget your username, you instructor can look it up for you.
If you forget your password, you will need to click on “Forgot your login info?” on the ALEKS home screen as shown
in the screenshot below. Then follow the online instructions to obtain your password.