Description
The first minute of instruction begins the moment that students enter the classroom or transition into a new subject (K-5), and effective teachers are prepared to engage students immediately in an independent activity that primes student minds for learning. During a bell-ringer or warm-up activity which takes approximately the first 5 minutes of instruction, the teacher can tackle managerial tasks such as taking attendance, checking in with individual students, or distributing instructional materials while the students are busy connecting with content independently. What makes a bell-ringer/ warm-up activity highly effective is that it serves 2 purposes. First, it is tied to prior knowledge or background knowledge, and secondly, it is intentionally tied to instruction that students will experience in the day's lesson.
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Engagement Activity
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Description
| Questions | Content | Time Frame |
| How are rigorous questions (DOK 2 & 3) questions provided and responded to? | What content is addressed? | The approximate time that the activity should take. | ||
| Bell Ringer / Warm-up | Activity tied to learning for the day, that is prepared for students upon arrival to class while teacher conducts managerial tasks. | Provided by teacher for students to address independently. | Prior learning that will be necessary for the day's lesson. | 5 minutes |
Reflection Task
Describe a bell-ringer activity that you used this year that required kids to activate prior knowledge and the activity connected kids to your lesson.
A great bell ringer that I have used in instruction is a tech tool called PADLET. I pose a question, and students can leave their answer on the PADLET. The site is www.padlet.com
ReplyDeleteAlso, I have used MENTIMETER. It is a tech tool that poses a question and students can reply with multiple choice, a paragraph or one-word response, or a rating scale. The site is www.mentimeter.com
Technology has an amazing ability to prime student minds for learning.
We start our day with a morning discussion during my Calendar time. My first graders get to tell me something that they did the afternoon or night before that they really enjoyed and then we discuss the days activities, before starting our daily Calendar ritual.
ReplyDeleteGreat information. Please reply with your name so others know whose idea this was.
DeleteWe do bell ringers or "warm-ups" as they are called in my class about 90% of the days. Most days these are questions from the prior day/s activities in science class. Wednesday's warm-up this week was asking if the students knew what it was? First day of Spring. We had discussed it the day before and then on Wednesday we actually drew in diagrams of the seasons and Earth/Sun model.
ReplyDeleteThat sentence should have read that I asked the students if they knew what today (Wednesday) was? Editing not allowed so I couldn't fix my oops. Jennifer Myers
DeleteIn the 6th grade beginner band classes students immediately come in, get their binders out and begin passing off their rhythms. When they come in the room the metronome is already going to give them a beat to follow. Students are given the entire rhythm packet the first week of school and they all go their own pace. Each new rhythmic concept is explained at the top of the page and students are encourged to use their prior knowledge to figure out the next concept. Once students have completed the packet by clapping and counting all the rhythms, they go back and play the rhythms on the intrument. This gives us an opportunity to hear individual tones, air streams, and intonation as well as helps them continue refining their rhythm counting.
ReplyDeleteThis comment was made by Michelle King, Band Director
DeleteCurrently, the first five minutes of my class is used by students to copy the daily activity into their interactive journal. My goal is to have students work ACT practice questions that correspond with the previous days lesson as a bell ringer.
ReplyDeletePhillip Parker
DeleteOur bell ringer tasks very from day to day. Some days, we have a couple of questions that review or preview a skill we're working on. Sometimes I have created a hands-on task for the kids to solve that will do the same thing. These puzzles are the favorites by far. The kids get to work cooperatively, and that's a plus. Because they're engaged, I often hear discussion on the topic and peer teaching happens spontaneously and authentically. Kids aren't afraid to ask other kids for help. The ones doing the teaching are reinforcing their own learning. Learning is fun stuff!
ReplyDeleteLinda,
DeleteHow were you able to get your name to show?
I use questioning much of the time to "hook" kids in and focus our attention on learning. We may discuss previous learning, "remember yesterday when we...", or it may be a front loaded question like "what do you know about a bar graph...?". This usually signals the beginning of our lesson. It gets students thinking about the topic at hand and focusing on our task.
ReplyDeleteNot sure why I'm unknown... LOL...
DeleteKaren Caver
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DeleteKaren, I like your questioning strategies which often lead to much higher thinking!
DeleteI start my morning off with students coming in for medication. Which I ask them if they have eaten breakfast, before I give them medication for the day. If they haven't then I send them to breakfast or have them eat crackers. I encourage them to drink plenty of water throughout the day, and the importance of it. I always make sure to tell them hope they have a great day, and just do the best they can. I always check my diabetic students blood sugar through my phone app, and check to see if she has eaten breakfast or not. If she hasn't then we have to administer insulin through her pump, and we always encourage her to learn all the steps as we enter it in her pod for her to learn how to do it on her own if she ever needed to do herself.
ReplyDeleteGreat information. Please reply with your name so others know whose idea this was.
DeleteLacie LaGrone
DeleteHere are a few ideas of bell ringers used in my classroom.....a variety of quotes, soft skills that are important in the work force, vocabulary words, video clips, discussing the previous days lesson, maybe a photo on the board that relates to the lesson, a QR code, or even a brain game.
ReplyDeleteGreat information. Please reply with your name so others know whose idea this was.
DeleteColette DePriest
DeleteIn sixth grade Science, we have "Daily Science" each day at the beginning of class that is a review of things learned recently.(I give them 5-8 min) We go over it, then jump into further learning.
ReplyDeleteGreat information. Please reply with your name so others know whose idea this was.
DeleteThis week in math we are working on subtraction to 10. In the morning basket today I had a subtraction worksheet, a farm scene mat and farm animals to manipulate to help them work the problems. We have been learning about farm animals this week.
ReplyDeletePosted by Melissa Anderson
DeleteWe do a journal over a relevant topic for discussion or an Everyday Edit as teams for points in writing class. In reading, they have a warmup that practices inference and making connections with expository texts. The odder the topics, the more intrigued the kids are!
ReplyDeleteShannon,
DeleteHow were you able to get your name to show?
You have to login to a Google account when you are ready to publish.
DeleteI LOVE technology and all things GOOGLE. This week I took Kindergarten Science TEKS over identifying animals, plants, and habits and created (as my niece Presley called it) a "super cool" bell ringer! Incorporating technology and allowing students to "show what they know" is always exciting.
ReplyDeleteBelow I'm pasting links to the bell ringer I made in Google Slides and some of the bell ringers I have used in the past.
For the first GS presentation (Kindergarten Science) the students will have to go to each slide in editing mode and move the words/pictures prior to putting it into presentation mode. The students can then show their knowledge from their device in presentation mode. What's great about this GS presentation is that it has been created to where the students can only move the words or pictures.
Kindergarten Science GS Presentation: http://bit.ly/2HBq4jc
In the second GS presentation, the instructions/descriptions of each activity are located in the speaker's notes! If anyone ever has any questions about integrating technology into your daily lesson cycles, contact me. I can help locate apps, videos, or show you how to incorporate tools to amp up student engagement.
Bell Ringer Activity Ideas GS Presentation: http://bit.ly/2UWsADX
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DeleteShelbye Almeida...
Delete...There we go! If you don't have an account with Blogger or your Google profile settings to allow you to post publicly, you show up as "unknown."
DeleteThanks Shelbye
DeleteMy Bell Ringer every day is a Reading daily warm-up. It's a short story, usually 3-4 paragraphs and has 3-4 comprehension questions. Its purpose is to practice using STAAR strategies used in class and to check for comprehension. Some stories are fiction and others are nonfiction with interesting facts about a specific topic.
ReplyDeletePosted by Christina Foster
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ReplyDeleteWe currently take the first 10 minutes of class to walk around the gym/track. During this time I check attendance on my phone and discuss the planned activity for the day. I am definitely open to any suggestions of a bell ringer for high school PE students.
ReplyDeleteI like to use a variety of bell ringers. One that my students really enjoy is a crossword puzzle created with vocabulary words taken from our story of the week. This allows students an opportunity to review story vocabulary as we later prepare to read and discuss it together. It also serves as a quick check to identify those students who continue to struggle with comprehension. This activity allows students to start thinking about our story in advance!
ReplyDeleteI LOVE fun activities that build vocabulary! As a whole, we are not (in Ms. Meggs's words) a "word rich" society. Anything we can do to build vocabulary will certainly help our students grow!
DeleteI have been using the vocabulary crossword puzzles as a review before we test. I like your idea of using it as a bell ringer.
Delete1st grade students arrive, put up their things, eat breakfast in the classroom, take an AR test over their library book and check out a new book from the library each morning. After 'taking care of business' I like them to get their brain in 'thinking mode' so they do a short activity. Most days they use their spelling words of the week in different ways. Throughout the week they might 'rainbow write' their words, use them to solve a crossword puzzle or unscramble them. Some days they review math concepts taught earlier in the week with math manipulatives, and some days they write in their journals. They love to 'free write' over any topic they choose and will often tell me the day before what they are going to write about. (Usually Friday mornings.) I have second language learners and inclusion friends in my room and I love to listen to the peer tutoring taking place!
ReplyDeleteThe "free write" activity sounds great! I'm glad to hear that the students are having FUN writing...I know it is sometimes hard to create that interest. Super job!
DeleteWe start our math class with a math problem in our math journal based on the skill we are working on. There are no answer choices provided. The students must show their work and produce their answer. I give them the same problem with multiple choice answers at the end of the class and they can check to see if they correctly worked the problem and got the correct answer.
ReplyDeleteGreat information. Please reply with your name so others know whose idea this was.
DeleteMy kindergarten students come in each morning and have breakfast in our classroom. Since they all arrive and finish breakfast at different times I have a morning basket with an activity for them to complete. For example, in science this week we were learning about farm animals. I had a farm animal sight word search for them to complete. Once they finished that there were manipulatives, such as duplo blocks, legos, and snap cubes with letters written on them. The kids could work in their table groups to build sight words until we were ready to get our day started.
ReplyDeleteYou do a great job managing Breakfast-in-the-Classroom and morning activities! I love when I see the kids working with hands-on manipulatives first thing in the morning...this gets their brains and bodies ready for the day!
DeleteAs other Primary teachers mentioned we begin our day with breakfast in the room with each student coming in at different times between 7:30-7:55. I have 4 tables in my room and each table has a tub that consist of a different fine motor skill activities. The students at the table can choose to work together with their table mates or independently during this time. Some of the activities consist of tweezers and pom-pom sorts, geoboards with rubberbands, or scissor cutting practice. Fine motor skills are very important for our kindergarteners to strengthen their hands for writing and other activities throughout the day.
ReplyDeleteI love the incorporation of fine motor skill activities during "Bell Ringer" time! Super job!
DeleteWhen I was teaching elementary ELAR (a long time ago), I loved using new technology - so I got a TV and VCR Player (remember I said a long time ago). We were studying adjectives and for a Bell Ringer one day, I used the TV and VCR of Charlotte's Web and played Zuckerman's famous pig song - "terrific pig" - "fine swine" - when students were coming into the room. They had instructions on the "chalk board" to work together or individually to think of as many adjectives they could that would describe Wilber the pig. The one that sticks in my mind was "pretty porker"! Loved my kids!
ReplyDeleteI bet that "technology" would fascinate our students today...ha, ha!!
DeleteThe bell ringers I’ve used from the start of school have evolved as the year has progressed.
ReplyDeleteOur morning routines have stayed consistent but the skills they work on each day normally Is a review from a prior lesson. Since February, journaling is what takes place immediately following breakfast. The topics are tied to science/social studies weekly lessons.
A great program for creating interactive bell ringers is Book Widget. It allows for the use of many different types of questions and graphics. It is compatible with Google Classroom and will actually allow students to send their responses to you if used in Google Classroom and will grade the responses. It will allow you to make worksheets, games and puzzles. (These do require a computer, Chromebook, or cell).
ReplyDeleteThe website is http://www.bookwidgets.com
Here are links to a few bell ringers that I have create:
https://www.bookwidgets.com/play/VG5HDB?teacher_id=5484780108906496&course_id=6178704913858560
https://www.bookwidgets.com/play/NG5EGJ?teacher_id=5484780108906496
https://www.bookwidgets.com/play/7G47H8?teacher_id=5484780108906496
I saved these to check out!
DeleteMy students start each day with breakfast in the classroom. Each morning when they finish breakfast, there is a morning activity for them to complete. Today's morning activity was a sentence writing review and letter formation activity.
ReplyDeleteEach morning when the students arrive they will find a journal entry on the board. It may be a previous STAAR topic, a new vocabulary word, a potential hook for an essay, or a response to a song or picture, etc. They have the first 5-7 minutes to complete the writing task. It is linked to prior learning or setting the scene for future learning. It allows me to get to know the students who don't verbally share their ideas often. It also lends to having a schedule that the students are comfortable following.
ReplyDeleteKim Horton, 10th grade ELA
DeleteMy bell ringer is when my students arrive to class they have a folder with a daily reading practice to work on and a edit for day. They are skills that we currently working on or will be covering soon.
ReplyDelete(Caroline Carter, 4th grade math) We follow pretty closely to the year at a glance (YAG) on TEK Resource. Within each unit there is a spiral review that can be printed from their website. This is what I use as my bell ringer or daily math as I call it. I have assigned students come in and pass everyone's math folder out. Students get out their daily math packet and work one problem individually, then we go over it together to get our lesson for the day started.
ReplyDeleteI display a photo (from Internet) and ask a question for the students to use specific knowledge from a previous lesson to infer about the photo. This helps the students to make real world connections to the lesson.....K.Hambrick
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DeleteOne of my favorite "Bell Ringers" is having my students write quick writes from a daily topic. For example, "Missed you Monday!" "Merry and Bright Monday!" They have to write what they can do to brighten someones day. "Tragic Tuesday..." "Would You Rather Wednesday?" I write choices for them to make. EX. hot or cold, squirrel or frog Of course they have to explain, Why? "Talented Thursday" , "Finally Friday"!! Every week it's different. I have also put names of all students on a sticky note and placed the sticky note on the board. Then they have to choose a name and write words of encouragement to that person. I like doing this before a big TEST! Depending on what we are studying, they will have to make sure it's added to the quick write. Ex. If we are working on compound sentences they have to have 2 or 3 compound sentences in their Quick Write
ReplyDeleteWhen I taught 8th Grade Science, each of my students kept a "Bell Ringer" folder. As they entered my classroom each day, they were to write down the questions that were written on the board and answer them within the first few minutes of the period. These questions either served as a review or as a means to set the tone for new learning. As I now walk the halls of Carthage Primary, I see many students taking part in "Bell Ringer" type activities to kick their day off!
ReplyDeleteKiley Schumacher
DeleteWhen I taught Junior High Math and Algebra I, I used to put a "Bell Ringer" math problem on display each period for students to try to solve while I greeted students entering the room and did attendance. Then I would give them the answer and quickly explain how to work the problem. These "Bell Ringer" problems usually served as a review. Occasionally I would give them a problem that served as a preview for new learning.
ReplyDeleteGreat "Bell Ringer" observed in CHS Biology classes this week. Biology EOC questions from released tests that correspond with the TEKS being taught that week. Great way to teach the subject matter but also a great time to incorporate test taking techniques. Good job Ms. Reyes and Mr. Waggoner!
ReplyDeleteIn Pre-AP Geometry the students check their homework then we spend a little time going over what they missed to make sure they know how to work the problems correctly before they get to their test.
ReplyDeleteMaggie Birdsong
DeleteThis year I am using the warm-up problems that come with the textbook. Next year, when I have chrome books, I hope to have ACT and TSI questions in google classroom so my students can answer 1 question a day for bonus points.
ReplyDeleteUsing chrome books will be great. Love the idea of ACT and TSI questions and the bonus points!
DeleteOver the last few weeks I've witnessed many new bell ringer activities in the classroom. The teachers at CJHS are really putting in the effort to come up with new and creative bell ringer activities. Students are engaged quickly and disruptions have been minimized.
ReplyDeleteIn World Geography, I use Bellringers that ask spiraling objectives that students need to always keep “fresh” on their minds as we make our way through all the regions of the world. The topics include: government systems, economic systems, 5 themes of geography ( absolute location, relative location, human-environment interaction, etc), 5 major religions, rain shadow effect, practicing map skills. ~Sherry Parker
ReplyDeleteI put a problem on the smart board to be solved before our morning announcements. After the announcements, the students have three minutes to walk around the room and have conversations about how they solved the problem. We then come back together and discuss various ways to get the correct answer.
ReplyDeleteDana Chambers
DeleteWhen my students enter the classroom, they first turn off their cell phones and place them in the closet so they can focus on the lesson. Journals and STAAR folders are passed out. Depending on the day's lesson, the warm up consists of: journal writing and on a volunteer basis "Care to Share" time that leads to class discussions. This also helps students learn how to express themselves in writing.
ReplyDeleteWhen I taught 2nd and 5th grade, the students had some type of activity for them to work while I tended to the students and/or tasks. The bell ringer activity helped me as a teacher set the tone for class learning. All of my bell ringers were paper due to lacking of technology back in the 90's. I can only imagine the neat bell ringers that can be integrated with technology now!
ReplyDeleteThis is Judy Reyes at Libby. Varying focus minilessons works best for second graders, but on Mondays, we usually do about the same thing because that's the day students get their new Second Grade Home School Connection. Students use the Connection as a tool all week, both at school and home (hopefully). On Monday, we go over the main reading comprehension, language arts and phonics TEKS for the week. Students enjoy trying to group the spelling words into groups according to phonics skills. They try to limit it to only four skills, but this year has been challenging (and sometimes funny) because of Saxon Phonics and Spelling. Then they complete a puzzle template with the spelling words to share with a friend. I have to limit time on task because they love this activity! No one has even complained about having to write every spelling word on the puzzle! I'm able to get morning tasks done while they are happily engaged.
ReplyDeleteWhen the students first come in, they get out their journals and began working on the warm up problems I have on the smart board. Most of the time it is only five problems, either reviewing what we have learned the previous week along with two multiplication problems (two digit by two digit) or it is just review place value which is one of my big three.
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ReplyDeleteWhen my students come in they are to write in their planner and gather their materials for class that day. I.E. reading journals, paper, pencil and any needed resources that are listed on the board. They are then to read and answer the daily warm-up question following their reading strategies and be able to defend their answer when we discuss it together as a group. My students,this past school year, knew that if they could defend and/or justify their answer, many times I would give them credit for an answer that wasn't considered "correct".
ReplyDeletemichael johnson - I used "Is water wet?" for a discussion topic as a bell ringer. This was part of a chemistry lesson that covered elements of the periodic table.
ReplyDeleteI will have the students go through a warm-up everyday and each week I will have a different student preform the warm-up activity.
ReplyDeleteI like to do WTL (Write to Learn). We did this at another district to help the students writing scores increase. As a bell ringer, students have some sort of prompt that they must write about in complete sentences.
ReplyDeleteI like to loop back to the previous day's lesson with the bell ringer. I have the students write and date the bell ringers in a notebook which is kept in the room. It can be put in their INB if you like. It helps to focus their minds on what we will be continuing to learn. It's important to have some sort of accountability system for the bell ringer completions.
ReplyDeleteCandace Johnson
DeleteJohn Dupnik- As a band director a bell ringer exercise that could be utilized is when knowing a piece the students will play in class that day, they should know the key signature for the piece on their respective instrument. As such asking the students to write on a piece of paper the notes in their key signature as well as any accidentals they may see on their music gets them focused and thinking about it ahead of time as we go through it in class.
ReplyDeleteA bell ringer I have used in the past is to have 1-3 math problems from the previous day's lesson. They would have a specific notebook for these daily problems that could then be used as a reference material before a unit test.
ReplyDeleteLeslie Parker
DeleteI have always used a bell ringer. One of the problems I encountered was the high level, highly motivated students would finish way before my "grow" students. I started having those students do peer to peer tutoring to help students around them get through the task and to keep them on task and deepen their own understanding.
ReplyDeleteI can start with a warm up on the board that will be a question pertaining to material we are to go over, with instructions to answer it via ( the handout for the day or his/her textbook) and then once that is done there will be a picture of the diagram or topic for that day on the board that they have to answer in teams/squads. Can also use Quizlet-live for this on the smart-board to engage kids and be as quick and efficient as possible. This will fire the kids up and engage their competitive side while also getting introduced to the material we are about to dive into
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ReplyDeleteI have used "Morning Math" with my 2nd graders, as a type of warm-up activity. This includes spiraling skills throughout the year. Once completed with this task, student routine included a facts practice on their ipads. This was the expectation every day. Worked very well for my students!
ReplyDeleteThis year, I plan to have real examples of social media grammatical errors up on the projector as kids come into the classroom for the kids to correct or think about. It will be kind of like the modern day version of the DOLs we did as a kid in language arts. This will illustrate to kids the importance of why they need to learn the content of my class. It will open discussions about how grammar, spelling, and knowing how to write in complete sentences with correct punctuation is important in real life applications.
ReplyDeleteI use bell-ringers to review concepts from the previous day/week and gauge student understanding of those concepts. It's usually 2-3 math problems that students work on their own, then I call on students to show their work for the class. I rotate through all students, so it's not the same ones every time. I also try to check students' work before they put it on the board so no one is embarrassed by incorrect answers. This helps give me an idea of concepts I need to re-teach or students I need to work with.
ReplyDeleteA bell ringer idea for Speech therapy is to practice one word from articulation therapy in the previous session as a review or to define a word from language therapy. All bell ringers will be used as a review from the previous session.
ReplyDeleteFor science, I would start out with a hands-on activity tied to our lesson for the day. For one warm-up, I had them create an imaginary animal and they had to describe how this animal survived in their environment. This tied into our focus lesson about features and adaptations.
ReplyDeleteKrista Dickerson... I use morning work as a structure to keep students engaged. When they enter the room they automatically go grab their binders and whiteboard and begin to work on their morning work. While they are working on their morning work I walk around the room and engage the students in a small 10 second conversation it can be about anything including what they ate for breakfast, did they sleep well etc. I also use this time to do a quick check for students emotional state before containing onto the days content.
ReplyDeleteI was able to observe a 5th grade Science class at another school. The students had access to Chromebooks, so their warm up each morning was to go to the Accu Weather website and record all the local weather data for that day. Students recorded the high temp, low temp, wind speed...etc. They put the information in a "Weather journal". Every six weeks they would look back in their journals at the weather trends.
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