Exit tickets that show who is lost

Who this is for

This guide is for teachers of any subject who want a fast, low-stakes way to see which students followed the lesson and which did not. It works with a class of 12 or 35, on paper, on sticky notes or on a shared form. It does not need a grade book, and it should not be graded.

The plan at a glance

• Pick one skill from today's lesson. Not the whole lesson, one skill.
• Write three questions for it: a check, a trap and an explain-it-back.
• Hand them out with three to five minutes left. Students answer alone, and put their name on the slip.
• Do quick sorting after class into three piles. This takes about five minutes for a normal class.
• Use the piles to plan tomorrow: who needs a re-teach, who needs practice and who can move on.

Step by step

1. 1. Choose one skill

   Finish the sentence "By the end of today, a student can ___." If the sentence needs the word "and", you have two skills. Make the ticket about the one that matters most for tomorrow.

2. 2. Write the check question

   This is a plain problem of the type you practiced, with numbers that are new. It tells you whether the skill works when you are not standing next to the student.

3. 3. Write the trap question

   Think of the most common wrong answer to this skill and show it as someone else's work. Ask the student to say whether it is right and fix it if not. Wrong answers on this question are useful because each one points at a specific misunderstanding.

4. 4. Write the explain-it-back question

   Ask for one sentence in the student's own words, or a rating of confidence with a reason. Students who can do the procedure but cannot explain it often stall on the next unit.

5. 5. Collect and sort

   Make three piles: got it, close, and lost. Write the common mistakes on a scrap of paper as you see them. Do not write comments on every slip. The goal is a decision, not a mark.

6. 6. Decide tomorrow

   Write down what the first ten minutes of the next lesson will be, based on the piles, before you put the slips away.

Worked example: adding fractions with unlike denominators

Say today's skill is: "A student can add two fractions with different denominators by finding a common denominator." Here is the ticket, with the answers worked out so you can sort quickly.

Check question 1 yourself: the least common denominator of 2 and 3 is 6. Then 1/2 = 3/6 and 1/3 = 2/6, so the sum is 5/6. Question 2 works as a trap because 2/5 is exactly what you get from adding tops and bottoms, and 2/5 = 0.4 is less than 1/2 = 0.5, so a sum that is smaller than one of its parts cannot be right.

Sorting the slips

Suppose a class of 24 sorts into 15 got it, 6 close and 3 lost. Check that the piles add up: 15 + 6 + 3 = 24. Tomorrow's first ten minutes can be a short re-teach with a fraction strip for the 9 students in the second and third piles, while the 15 start on a mixed problem set. The 3 lost students also get a minute with you at the start of independent work.

Making the most of your ticket

• Keep it to three minutes of student time. If students need ten, it is a quiz.
• Use the same layout every time so students stop spending time reading instructions.
• Tell students the ticket is not graded and that you read every one. Both parts need to be true.
• Return the common mistake to the whole class without naming anyone, for example "Some of us added the bottoms."

If something goes wrong

• Everyone is in the lost pile. The lesson did not land, not the students. Start tomorrow with a different explanation, not with the same one slower.
• Everyone is in the got it pile. The questions were too close to the examples. Next time change the numbers more or make the trap harder.
• You ran out of time. Cut to one check question and one explain-it-back. A one-question ticket you actually read beats a three-question ticket you do not.
• Students copy each other. Ask for the answer on a slip they fold, or use different numbers on two versions.

Keep it going

Keep a simple tally, one line per lesson, of how many students ended up in each pile. Over a few weeks you will see which kinds of skills your class finds hard and where to give more time. Pair tickets with a few retrieval questions at the start of the next lesson, and use the trap questions you wrote as material for a worked example sheet.

If you want help drafting trap questions, DuckyHelper can be asked out loud with one key press while you plan, and it can work through a problem on its blackboard so you can see the usual wrong turns. Check every answer yourself before it goes on a slip.