Assignments are exercises, usually essays or other writing, that distance learners are expected to complete at regular intervals throughout their course. The assignment serves two main purposes. First it provides students with a vehicle for organizing their understanding of what they are studying. People seld om learn only by listening or observing, but must practice and in other ways engage themselves with the subject of their study. The assignment is a planned and controlled technique for providing this engagement.

Second, the assignment provides instructors with feedback that helps them determine that their students are mastering the subject, and to identify individual problems that may require remedial action. For the students, receiving the instructor's comments about their assignments is particularly important in maintaining motivation. Assignments must be carefully designed, to fit with course, module and unit objectives. In institutions where students are graded, the system for determining grades of each assignment, standardizing and monitoring the grading is a complex administrative as well as teaching process.

• Michael G. Moore and Greg Kearsley, Distance Education: A Systems View—Tests and Assignments

• Information for submitting assignments from the Open University of Hong Kong