5 Excellent Exit Slips for Secondary Students

Exit slips are important tools that allow teachers to check students understanding of the material so they can adjust future lessons to address student needs. Here are a few exit slip formats that can add variety to your end of class routine.

All of these can be modified to work on Google Forms, Google Slide/PowerPoint, Google Classroom Feed, Canvas Assignment, by email, or pretty much any other digital interface your students have access to.

1. Text Me

In the text me exit slip you will give the students an image of a phone with a conversation from a friend. Their friend will ask a question regarding that days topic and the student will have to "reply". Have fun and put your personality into it. The funnier the messages are the better the responses.

2. Square-Triangle-Circle

The square-triangle-circle exit slip gives the students 3 prompts they have to answer. The first question, or square question, has the student identify a fact from the day that makes sense with something they already know. For example, if a student is learning how to subtract fractions, they may notice notice in order to solve the problem they have to have a common denominator like when they learned how to add fractions.

The second question, or triangle question, has the student identify 3 new facts they learned that day. For example, if you are learning about the Battle of the Bulge the student might list the following facts: The battle happened December 16, 1944. The battle lasted 5 weeks. The Germans' initial attack involved around 410,000 men.

The third question, or circle question, has the student write something they are still wondering about. An example of this could be a student who learned about a simple circuit in science class asking what would happen if they added another battery to the circuit.

3. Newspaper

Have your students fill out a newspaper over what they learned. You can easily change this from a simple exit slip to a more involved exit slip by adjusting the requirements. A simple exit slip might have the students write a headline for what they learned while a more complex newspaper exit slip would have the student write a headline, paragraph over what they learned, and find a correlating picture.

Finding a template to use is also easy. Just type "newspaper template" in a search engine or create your own if you have a specific look in mind.

4. Emoji

Have the student tell you how well they understood a topic by using an emoji Likert scale. Then have the student pick an emoji (or series of emojis) that represent what they learned. There's a lot of freedom with this format. You can have students use an emoji to answer any number of questions.

5. Word Sort

Give the student a list of words or phrases that they have to sort into categories. This exit slip can vary depending on the teacher's guidelines. For example you can give students vocabulary words and categories or you could give the students words and have them create their own categories. The way students sort the information can give the teacher insight into their understanding and a chance to address any misconceptions.