Exit Tickets for Staff or Students

Exit tickets or exit slips are a quick and easy assessment tool…and can be much more! They are essentially a closure or exit out the door after a lesson, meeting, the end of a unit, or the end of a term, etc.

There are many ways to use exit tickets.

They are useful for:

Reflection
Self-Analysis
Checking workplace climate
Boosting morale

1) Reflection

Reflective exit tickets cause the staff or student to give serious thought or consideration to a prompt. Most exit tickets are intended to be quick, however, reflection may take a little longer. Ask a staff member, “What do you want your students to remember most about you?” or “What piece of advice would you give yourself five years ago?” might take a little longer than “What was the best thing that happened to you today?”.

The answers derived from exit tickets inform the principal or teacher. They help them plan for intervention or enrichment, or to drive the next step, goal, or lesson.

Photo by Jon Tyson on Unsplash

2) Self-Analysis

Exit tickets give valuable information in the form of self-analysis. Prompts help staff to rate their own performance. Example: “What is one area that you can improve professionally? “. Or, “In what ways am I challenging my students?”.

For students, a self-analysis question might be, “If you could change one thing about your learning today, what would it be?” or “How much effort did you put into your work today?”. If students are more aware of their effort, it often leads them to work harder if they aren’t working to full potential.

3) Checking your workplace climate

Do you want a temperature reading on your staff climate or staff morale? Ask a good question with an exit ticket! You may want to tell them they don’t have to sign the ticket to allow for more candid answers. That would be up to you as an administrator and your knowledge of your campus. Here’s an example question: “What is the best thing about our workplace?” or “What is one thing that you would change in your workplace if cost were no object?”.

Students can be asked similar questions. Example: What is the best thing about our classroom? What is one thing that you would change about our classroom if cost were no object?

Photo by Kelly Sikkema on Unsplash

4) Boosting morale

Yes! Questions or prompts can boost staff morale! Let your staff (or students) focus on the positive. Example: “What are you grateful for today?” or “Write down one thing you can do to help or encourage a colleague (or classmate).”

It’s so easy to complain or talk about our problems. There are times for that, but if that’s all that is happening on your campus or in your classroom, it will breed negativizes. And who likes to be around “Negative Nellies”??

When I was a classroom teacher, I used to tell my students when they said something ugly (a Texas term meaning not nice!) to another student, that they then had to think of something nice to say to that person! It was a quick way to get them to re-focus a negative thought into a positive one. Okay, maybe it took a little longer for some to re-focus…HA!

The nice thing about boosting morale with exit tickets is that they can be handed out any time, not just as an exit strategy. Have staff complete at the beginning of a staff meeting and then call on those that would like to share their answers!

The following files are ready-to-go exit tickets in my shop. The questions are already prepared for you and the good news is that each file lets you customize to fill out your own questions!

Click the picture(s) for more details