CONTEXT The literature has shown the importance of students developing threshold concepts and undertaking formative assessment. There are also suggestions within the literature that many students will not undertake beneficial activities that display no direct reward in terms of grades. A new electrical engineering common first year subject with 450 students resulted in bottle necks for providing effective feedback. An online self-paced tutorial resource was created that advanced students through core threshold concepts, supplemented with non-assessed activities that guided students through the process of solving problems and understanding class materia