Checking for Understanding & Feedback
Exit Ticket
A few final questions collected at the door tell you what to teach tomorrow
Use this when
What is it?
An Exit Ticket is a set of one to three questions that students answer silently and independently in the last five minutes of a lesson, then hand in as they leave. You sort the responses rather than mark them and use the findings to shape tomorrow's teaching. It replaces two of teaching's least reliable signals, "any questions?" and a confident nod, with thirty individual responses, collected while there is still time to act.
The steps
- Write the ticket when you plan the lesson, not at 2:55. Ask what students must be able to do by the end. Include one recall question, one application question and, optionally, "What's one thing you're still unsure about?" If you cannot write the ticket, the lesson's intended outcome is not yet clear.
- Keep the format fixed and small. Use slips, the back page or a corner of the book. Follow the same routine every day: five minutes, silent, with names included. Explain why:This one's for me, not for marks: it tells me what to teach tomorrow.
- Collect at the door. Make this part of your exit routine (Strong Finish): students place tickets in your hand or in a tray on their way out.
- Sort, don't mark. Make three piles in five minutes: got it, nearly, not yet. Do not add grades, ticks or comments. The ticket is a quick check, not an assignment.
- Respond visibly in tomorrow's lesson. Begin with the pattern you found:Two-thirds of us nailed the method, but half dropped the units. Watch the first example.Reteach when the not yet pile is the majority; when it contains only a few tickets, work with those students as a small group.
- Keep the feedback loop visible. Students need to see that their tickets shape future lessons. This encourages honest answers and genuine effort.
What it looks like
Five minutes before the end, Mr Bakker's 10-year-olds know the routine: slips out and three questions on the board: a perimeter calculation, a spot-the-mistake question and one thing you're not sure about yet. The room is mostly silent; he reminds one table, "Your own thinking, please. It's for me." At the door, he collects the slips.
That evening, he spends about ten seconds sorting each slip: fourteen got it, nine nearly, all with the same error, an extra side added, and four not yet. Six slips ask some version of "When do we multiply instead of add?" Tomorrow's Do Now contains three perimeter questions and one incorrect answer to fix. He begins by saying, "Your tickets told me something interesting."
How you’ll know it’s working
- The ticket is ready at planning time, before the lesson rather than afterwards.
- The last five minutes are silent and independent, and collection forms part of the exit routine.
- The teacher can describe the three piles from memory the next morning.
- Tomorrow's lesson clearly responds to the tickets, and students hear how their answers shaped it.
Pitfalls & fixes
- Too many questions. Ten-question tickets create an unmanageable marking load, which can end the routine within a fortnight. Three questions that can each be sorted in seconds are the limit.
- Vague questions. "How did you find today?" produces feelings rather than evidence. Every question needs an answer you can sort as right, nearly or not yet.
- Collecting and never acting. This is worse than not collecting because it teaches students that the routine has no purpose, so their answers become less meaningful. If you cannot act on the information tomorrow, do not collect it today.
- Grading them. As soon as tickets carry marks, students focus on appearing correct rather than answering honestly, and the evidence becomes less reliable. Keep them consequence-free and say so.
Weigh it up
Why it’s worth it
- You identify a misconception on the day it forms, rather than a week later in a pile of books. Thirty individual responses replace the confident nod while there is still time to act.
- The marking load falls. Sorting into three piles takes minutes, while marking takes hours and often does not change tomorrow's teaching.
- Tomorrow's plan is half-written: the piles tell you whether to reteach, adjust or move on, and yesterday's Exit Ticket can become today's Do Now.
- Students see that their answers influence future lessons, making honesty feel worthwhile. "I don't get it" becomes useful information to share, which can change the classroom culture.
- The last five minutes have a silent, purposeful routine instead of drifting towards the bell.
The costs
- It takes time twice each day: five lesson-minutes that could have been used for practice, and a nightly sorting routine that is light per class but builds across a timetable: five groups means 150 slips a day. More sustainable options exist: rotate two focus classes each day, or use Exit Tickets every lesson but sort them thoroughly only twice a week.
- The information can prompt overreaction. One rushed set of tickets after a hot afternoon may be unreliable, and replanning everything every night is a quick way to abandon the routine.
Adaptations
- Early years / lower primary: use oral or show-me versions: a sticker vote on the way out, or one question answered aloud to the teacher at the door.
- Secondary / post-16: in exam classes, use a past-paper fragment for one question so that sorting also provides a gap analysis.
- Large classes: sort every slip into piles, but read the "unsure about" response for a different row each day, rotating through the class.
- Digital classrooms: a form can sort the piles automatically. Keep the "one thing you're unsure about" box: this is where the useful surprises appear.
Where this comes from
Exit Tickets are a long-standing end-of-lesson practice, codified by Doug Lemov in Teach Like a Champion. Their foundation is Black and Wiliam's case for formative assessment: learning improves when teaching responds to evidence, not when the evidence is simply collected.
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