Threshold Greeting

The steps

1. Prepare the room to run without you. Put the Do Now on the board and lay out anything students need before they arrive. You can stay at the door only if the students inside can work independently (see Do Now).
2. Take up position in the doorway. Stand at the threshold, with the corridor on one side and the classroom on the other. Angle yourself so students pass you as they arrive and you can still see the room.
3. Greet each student by name. Make eye contact, use the student's name and add a brief welcome.
   Morning, Priya. Good to see you.
   When possible, personalise about one greeting in three: mention yesterday's answer or the weekend match, or offer a specific thank-you. Keep each greeting to a few seconds so the queue continues moving.
4. Notice how each student arrives. Look for anyone who seems flat, wound up or unusually quiet. If one brief sentence could help, offer it now.
   You look tired. Start quietly, and I'll check in with you in a few minutes.
5. Reset small things at the threshold. If a student enters shouting or in the middle of an argument, calmly ask them to try again:
   Let's have that again. Walk in, and I'll see you at your desk.
   Keep your tone light, then greet them properly on the second attempt.
6. Step inside when the flow of arrivals slows. Greet latecomers quietly by name at their desks. Then begin reviewing the Do Now. The whole greeting routine takes about three minutes.

How you’ll know it’s working

• Watch five minutes of arrivals across more than one lesson: nearly every student hears their own name, and you make eye contact with them.
• Students pass the door, sit down and begin the task without further instructions, so the room fills with students who are already working.
• Public corrections in the first ten minutes become rare. Count them across a fortnight: the number falls as more issues are addressed quietly at the door.
• Students begin greeting you in return. More of them use your name, hold eye contact or arrive with something they want to tell you.

Weigh it up

Why it’s worth it

• In the one trial, classes greeted at the door spent about twenty percentage points more time on task, and disruption fell sharply. The routine takes about three minutes and requires no marking.
• It makes behaviour management more preventative. You have a private opportunity to notice and respond to a difficult mood before the lesson begins.
• It resets the relationship each day. A student who received a detention yesterday still receives today's welcome, helping both of you move on from the consequence.
• Every student receives a guaranteed moment of individual contact with you each lesson, including quieter students who might otherwise go weeks without one. If you teach 150 students, this is a practical way to know each of them slightly better over time.
• Paired with a Do Now, it makes better use of the opening minutes: students begin learning while you are still greeting, and you reach the front already aware of the room's mood.

The costs

• It needs to happen every day to work well. Being at the door before every class means leaving your previous room promptly and giving up a few minutes of preparation or rest; an occasional greeting is unlikely to have the same effect.
• It depends on an established entry routine. Until the class can begin a task without you, standing at the door means leaving the room without your direct supervision.
• Some timetables make it difficult. Split sites, supervision duties and back-to-back practicals can prevent the full version on some days, but greeting students from just inside the door preserves much of the value.