Given the new educational challenges of Covid-19, we wanted to make it possible for teachers to assign, collect, and review online crossword puzzles and word searches.

We’ve implemented the following changes that should make it easier for you to collect and manage puzzles that are submitted online. With these new features, you can now:

• Create a crossword or word search that can be solved online 
• Collect puzzles from students who complete them online
• Accept incomplete puzzles or puzzles with mistakes 
• View detailed reports about individual submissions 
• See individual student scores and answers

We hope these changes make it easier for you to work in a remote learning setting. See below for answers to commonly asked questions about assigning and solving online crossword puzzles and word searches. As always, please contact us if you have any additional questions or issues using the site. 

FAQs: Collecting and Scoring Puzzles from Students

How Do I Create a Puzzle That Can Be Solved Online?

You can accept online submissions for any crossword or word search without making any changes to your puzzle. Simply make and publish a crossword or word search, as usual. After publishing your puzzle, click “accept online submissions” to let your students submit their work.

Make a Crossword | Make a Word Search

 

Who Can Use These New Features? How Can it Help Me?

Anyone who makes a crossword or word search can accept online submissions after the puzzle is published. This feature can be especially useful for teachers who want to assign online crosswords to students, creators who want to share their puzzles with friends and family, and bloggers or others who want to hold contests. 

How Can I Collect Work from My Class or Group?

It’s easy to set up your crossword puzzle or word search to accept submissions. Here are the steps:

1. Create and publish a crossword or word search. Once you have your puzzle exactly how you want it, click the ‘Preview+Publish’ button. Review your content and select your publishing options.
   
   
2. Select ‘Accept Online Submissions’ on the Creator Panel. Make sure to review and customize the online solving options, such as hiding the answer key or disabling error checking to find the right challenge level for your group.
   
   
3. Share your puzzle with your group. Send your class or group the customized puzzle link found on your Creator Panel. If you’ve protected your puzzle with a password, make sure to send it to your group, too. When your student is ready to turn-in their answers, they just click ‘submit’ and the answers will automatically be stored with your puzzle.
   
   Note: Your student does not have to create an account to solve and submit the puzzle. 
   
   
4. Review submissions. Open your puzzle and scroll down to ‘Online Submissions’ on the Creator Panel. There, you will see how many responses you’ve received so far and a link for reviewing the work your students or group members have turned in. 

Do My Students Need Accounts to Submit a Puzzle?

No. No one needs an account to solve an online crossword puzzle or word search. To provide access to your crossword or word search, just share your puzzle’s custom link, which can be found on the Creator Panel. If you’ve opted to protect your puzzle with a password, make sure to provide it to your class or group.

Something’s not working well. What can I do?

All new features have the occasional snag. If you encounter any issues or have any recommendations for improvement while using My Crossword Maker or My Word Search, please click the ‘Report an Issue’ button at the top of every page. You can also look through our crossword FAQs and word search FAQs to see if they can answer common issues.

We hope these new features for solving online word searches and crossword puzzles will be helpful. Now that you know what’s new, you can get started by creating a crossword that can be solved online or a word search.