Are Exit Tickets Old News?
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As teachers, we need a constant understanding of what our students are comprehending from their daily lessons. We don’t need an in-depth look every single day, but we need a snapshot, or a formative assessment, at the end of each unit or session.
So how do we gather this information without making things more complicated on ourselves?
Exit Tickets
Exit tickets are a quick and easy way that we can hear from our students each and every day. There are numerous formats or layouts that can be used to give teachers a quick peek at what their students comprehended or where there are still gaps in learning.
The “ticket” is assigned at the end of a lesson or class time and typically takes a few minutes at the most for a student to complete. The exit ticket is not designed to count as a grade for the student, but rather to aid the teacher in knowing what needs to be reviewed or taught during the next lesson.
Benefits of Exit Tickets
Besides the obvious benefit of knowing where your students’ level of comprehension is, exit tickets carry many other uses in the classroom as well. Certain templates will allow you to group students appropriately the next time you do group work. They can add accountability to the student.
If the regular routine in your classroom is to have an exit ticket, the student may focus more during the lesson to be prepared. Exit tickets can also add an element of fun to a lesson.
For example, in these exit ticket templates, students might be asked to design a t-shirt about what they have learned. Or they may create an Instagram post sharing their knowledge with others. This method of formative assessment also allows your students to ask questions in a non-threatening way, deepening their understanding.
Plus, when you use a template for exit tickets, you can assign them for EVERY subject!!!
Text Connections
Research has shown that students comprehend more of what they read when they have a purpose for reading. This is often accomplished through text connections. We want students to connect one text to another, connect a text to something in their own lives and/or connect a text to something in the world.
Exit tickets are a simple way to have students make these connections after reading. These templates include multiple sentence frames for each type of text connection. None of the work for you… all the connections for your students!
Exit tickets serve many purposes in the classroom. This is especially true when students are engaged and allowed some creativity when showing their knowledge.
The ticket does not have to be complicated or create more work for the teacher. By using made for you templates, the work is already done and you can simply gain the benefits.
