Once you’ve gotten the hang of completing the Mini for about a week or so, it’s time to try a Monday puzzle.

Diving into the daily

Opening up the daily crossword can be daunting, especially if it’s your first time solving. Don’t be scared! Contrary to popular belief, the crossword is not a competition over how much trivia one knows. Yes, random facts and knowledge will come in handy when you’re filling out the crossword grid, but believe in yourself.

When attacking the grid head-on, take a few tries to figure out your style of solving. Jackie likes to go around the grid and fill in what she knows. Then she’ll continue to go back through and see if her memory has been prompted by any letters that were filled in or if an answer has “just come” to her the second or third time around. Isaac likes to start with easier clue types, like fill-in-the-blanks or abbreviations.

Rachel Fabi, a Wordplay columnist, takes a different approach. “I start every puzzle the same way: I start in the northwest and work my way through,” she said. “So it’ll be going back and forth between across and downs in the corner and then building off of what you have, until you have the whole thing.”

Have you gotten as far as you can? Try using autocheck to make sure your answers are correct. Do you need to adjust anything? Go ahead. If you’re still stuck, check out Wordplay, your new best friend. Wordplay is a daily column written by Games editors that explains tricky clues, answers and more about the New York Times Crossword. That one word Rachel, Deb Amlen or Caitlin Lovinger provides there may be the key you need to unlock the rest of your puzzle. And they’re great at explaining what certain crossword clues are asking you to do, or how they might trick you.