Although the idea of exit tickets is well known, figuring out how to master using them in your middle & high school math classes is a different story. From finding time to create them, remembering to actually give them, and teaching your students how to do them, this 5-part blogging series covers it all. At the end, there’s even a bonus installment that’s all about how to turn your exit tickets digital!
This is a bonus installment in the Everything You Ever Wanted To Know about Using Exit Tickets in your Math Classroom blogging series to show you how to take an exit ticket template that you use and love, and turn it into a digital format for your students to complete. As we grapple with hybrid schedules and the possibility of distance learning, this is more important than ever!
This is the fifth installment in the Everything You Ever Wanted To Know about Using Exit Tickets in your Math Classroom blogging series. If you haven’t already, check out the first four posts and then keep reading!
Read Post 1 here – 5 Reasons you Should be Using Exit Tickets in Your Middle & High School Math Class. This post covers what an exit ticket is and why you would want to use one in your math class.
Read Post 2 here – How often should I use an exit ticket? A secondary math teacher explains all. This post discusses how often you should be giving an exit ticket, and ways to save time in creating them so you can actually keep up and make it routine.
Read Post 3 here – How to Implement Exit Tickets like a Math Teacher Pro. This post discusses how to introduce them to your students and tips for actually remembering to give them each day!
Read Post 4 here – What do I do now? What to do with the exit tickets after your students hand them in. Reviewing, feedback, grading, and more! This post goves over all of the logistics and teacher-decisions behind what to do after your students actually complete an exit ticket. This one is jam-packed with easy-to-implement ideas!
This is the fourth installment in the Everything You Ever Wanted To Know about Using Exit Tickets in your Math Classroom blogging series. If you haven’t already, check out the first three posts and then keep reading!
Read Post 1 here – 5 Reasons you Should be Using Exit Tickets in Your Middle & High School Math Class. This post covers what an exit ticket is and why you would want to use one in your math class.
Read Post 2 here – How often should I use an exit ticket? A secondary math teacher explains all. This post discusses how often you should be giving an exit ticket, and ways to save time in creating them so you can actually keep up and make it routine.
Read Post 3 here – How to Implement Exit Tickets like a Math Teacher Pro. This post discusses how to introduce them to your students and tips for actually remembering to give them each day!
This is the third installment in the Everything You Ever Wanted To Know about Using Exit Tickets in your Math Classroom blogging series. If you haven’t already, check out the first two posts and then keep reading!
Read Post 1 here – 5 Reasons you Should be Using Exit Tickets in Your Middle & High School Math Class. This post covers what an exit ticket is and why you would want to use one in your math class.
Read Post 2 here – How often should I use an exit ticket? A secondary math teacher explains all. This post discusses how often you should be giving an exit ticket, and ways to save time in creating them so you can actually keep up and make it routine.
This is the second post in the Everything You Ever Wanted To Know about Using Exit Tickets in your Math Classroom series. If you missed the first one about the 5 Reasons you Should be Using Exit Tickets in Your Middle & High School Math Class, you can catch up and read it here.
Now that you’re familiar with what an exit ticket is and why you should be using them in your math classes, let’s dig into some of the details. If you haven’t already read my first post in this series, make sure to read this first!
Exit slips, exit tickets, tickets out the door, quick-checks, check-ins, show me what you know’s…whatever you call them, they’re incredible teaching tools that every secondary math teacher should be incorporating into their regular teaching practice. In this first installment of the Everything You Ever Wanted To Know about Using Exit Tickets in your Math Classroom series, and I wanted to dive straight into the reasons why YOU, yes you, will benefit from using exit tickets in your classes. No need to waste any time, let’s get into it!
Starting the year off right is SO important for any class, but especially in Algebra in particular, since everything that is done in the first unit is used throughout the entire year. Students NEED to have a strong foundation, or else they’ll be fighting an uphill battle all year, which is no good. I’ve spent a lot of time thinking about what topics are most important for students to know (from vocabulary to skills), so that each following unit has a strong foundation.
Here are all of the notes I used with my students during the 1st unit of Algebra 1.
If you follow me on Twitter, you might have seen the following tweet about a month ago.
You could say I got a bit behind on my semester 1 INB gluing and, as a result, my INB posts have fallen by the wayside. Semester 1 ended the first week of February and I’m just now getting around to catching up on getting it organized, since I’ve had a few snow days in a row (I really thought this would be a snow-day free year, but nope!).
Without any further ado, here are my INB pages for Unit 4 of Algebra 1: Linear Functions. Note: There were activity/quiz/review days built into this unit–the days listed out are for days that note-taking occurred.
Unit 3 of Algebra 1 is all about solving equations and their applications. We start off with multi-step equations, because 1-step and 2-step equations were covered in Unit 1: Foundations of Algebra. 
Day 1: Multi-Step Equations
In addition to the notes that went into our composition books, students were each given a full-sized flowchart over solving one-variable equations. We did an example as a class, and then I also keep a class set laminated so students can use them with dry-erase markers whenever they like. Students referenced their notes and the laminated flowcharts while working on homework in class. 
Day 2: Solving Multi-Step Equations with Special Case Solutions
To start off the lesson, we did a recap warm-up over the prior day’s lesson. 
We then went into a foldable that covers what special solutions are and when they arise. 
To get even more practice, students did the following Types of Solutions Sort, which emphasized common student errors and misconceptions I’ve noticed in the past. 
Day 3: Writing Equations to Solve Multi-Step Equations
We started off the lesson with a recap warm-up that contained special solution types. 
From there, we moved into our main set of notes for the day, with an emphasis on marking the text (NOTE: this is the same color-coding we used in Unit 1). 
Day 4: Absolute Value Equations
Like usual, we started off the lesson with a recap warm-up of the previous day’s information. 
We started off the topic of absolute value equations by really thinking about what an absolute value means/does. 
From there, we used the information we’ve gathered to solve absolute value equations a bit more efficiently (without using the modified cover-up question mark method). Students had the even numbered problems as homework that night. 
In addition to the notes that went into the composition books, students were given a flowchart for solving absolute value equations to reference whenever they got stuck. Here’s an example of how they could use it! Just like the others, I keep a class set of these laminated so students can use them with dry erase markers whenever they get stuck. I like to color-code each type of flowchart to make it easy to grab the exact one that they need from that unit. 
Day 5: Absolute Value Equations Word Problems
To begin the class, we started off by working backwards: writing the absolute value equation that could’ve produced the given solutions. 
From there, we went into story problems involving absolute value equations. 
Day 6: Ratios and Proportions
We started the day off with a recap warm-up covering the last two days of information (all absolute value equation related).
The first thing that we talked about is what a ratio is and what it means to be proportional. 
We then used the definition of proportional to solve equations requiring cross-multiplication. 
After these examples, students filled out the other side of the flowchart that they were given on Day 1 with a more difficult example of solving for a variable in a proportion. 
Day 7: Percent of Change
Percent of change is a funny topic to cover in Oregon…most of our textbook’s examples are about sales tax, and we have none. If we go to Washington, we just flash our Oregon ID and presto, bingo, bango, no more sales tax (for the little stuff). Anyway, we find other examples to try to make it more meaningful. 
After taking notes, we did this Percent of Change Scavenger Hunt. Students worked really hard on it and had a lot of fun. For some of them, it was difficult to remember to put a negative sign on their r-value when it was a percent decrease!
Day 8: Literal Equations, Part 1
We recap percent of change problems and then move into basic solving literal equations problems. 
We discuss what a literal equation is, compare and contrast the difference between literal equations and regular equations, and also introduce the flowchart method of solving. 
Day 9: Literal Equations, Day 2
We move into more complicated literal equations that require more than one step to solve. After doing a few, students are able to choose which method they wish to solve with (I’m partial to the algebraic method, but some students love the flowchart way). 
After notes, we play my favorite Connect 4 game for solving literal equations. We only played until 6 people won, which allowed us to get through about 70% of the problems. From there, students spent the remainder of class working on a festive Carving Pumpkins coloring activity for solving literal equations. This activity was awesome because students were super engaged in the coloring (every last one of them–even the boys! PS: I have 22 boys in this one class…ay, yai, yai), and it was super easy for me to find common trends that I might need to readdress (the eyes for Pumpkin #2 were the most common error). Also, for students, this activity is fairly self-checking, which is a great confidence boost for many of them.
Here’s an example that one student colored! She even named the pumpkins. 
Day 10: Stations Review Activity Day
We did a recap warm-up over solving literal equations and then spend the rest of class doing a stations activity with my solving equations unit task cards. 
Day 11: Review Day
Day 12: TEST!
Math by the Mountain 