Lessons · Teaching · the first five minutes
The first five minutes
The start of a lesson is a routine that runs without you: something on the board before they arrive, done alone, that needs nothing from you to begin.
Hone is a place to practise a career, one idea a day. This is one of its lessons, written out in full and free to read without an account.
What it is for
You spend the first eight minutes of every lesson getting them in, settling them and taking the register, and by the time you start you are behind and slightly cross. The first five minutes are the most controllable part of the whole day and the easiest part to give away.
How to think about it
The same thing every day, on the board before the bell, needing nothing from you. Four retrieval questions: last lesson, last week, last term, and one thing you will need today. Take the register while they work, then start the lesson standing next to somebody's answer.
Worked example
On the board before the bell: 4 questionsWritten the night before. If it needs you, it is not a routine.
Q1 last lesson, Q2 last week, Q3 last term, Q4 what today needsSpaced retrieval and the hook for today, inside the same four questions.
Register taken while they work: 3 minThe administration happens inside the routine rather than instead of it.
Answers read out, 90 s, nothing markedCorrection is part of it. Four questions with no answers given teach half as much.
Your turn
A three minute starter runs every lesson across 180 lessons. Write the line that totals the starter minutes in the year.
3 × 180 = min
Solve one, graded on the server
The trap
Making the starter today's new content. A starter that needs teaching needs you, and the entire point of it is five minutes that run while you are doing something else.