All Hands Up

At the start of term, my colleague suggested that we implement "All Hands Up" in our sixth form lessons. Put simply, he proposed that we should expect every student's hand to go up for easy questions we might ask to check for listening during an explanation. 

I was not on board. I immediately pushed back, suggesting it was authoritarian, false, and added nothing to the more popular “hands down” cold call.

I was wrong. After observing it in action, I was sold. The energy in his classroom was something I had never seen before, and the participation ratio was through the roof. I set about implementing it in most of my classes. I also read Pritish Raichura’s incredible blog and his fantastic podcast with Craig Barton. The following are my thoughts on what "All Hands Up" has added to my classroom—and also its limitations.

---

What It Can Do:

Energy

The first thing "All Hands Up" adds to your classroom is high energy. The lesson feels much more engaging if every student has their hand up, willing to answer a question. No one is loafing, switching off, or daydreaming. You can be sure every student is with you, ready to participate.

Checks for Engagement

It is sometimes difficult to know which students aren’t really focused or taking part in the lesson. "All Hands Up" allows you to get a good idea of who is motivated and wants to be in the classroom and who doesn’t. Particularly with new sixth form classes, it makes it clear which students you need to keep an eye on, as their hands are more reluctant to go up when you ask a question.

Behaviour Management

There are two aspects to this: first, you are setting your expectations very high if you expect every student to put their hand up; and second, given the quickfire nature of the questioning, students simply don’t have space to misbehave. It’s also crucial to follow up with students who aren’t putting their hands up and find out why. If you’re addressing students who don’t raise their hands, they’re unlikely to commit worse behaviours.

Checks for Listening During an Explanation

The real magic of "All Hands Up" shows when you use it to check for listening during an explanation. After any definition or statement, I always say, “OK, all hands up,” and expect every student to be prepared to tell me what I just said. The fact that students are expected to put their hand up every few seconds can only lead to them listening intently to your explanation.

---

Areas to think about:

Checks for Understanding

"All Hands Up" can be used to check for understanding—you might ask the class a question, get them to discuss with their partner, then call for "All Hands Up" and take a few answers. However, with a class of 30, the participation ratio is small. It would be more effective to use mini-whiteboards and have every student write an answer to show you. This also gives you more data to work with.

Recall

Similarly, "All Hands Up" can be used for recall, but mini-whiteboards provide more data and allow everyone to participate. I actually prefer to have students write answers down and peer mark for recall, then get every student to write their score out of 10 on a whiteboard and hold it up.

---

To Conclude:

There are some parts of the lesson where "All Hands Up" is a gamechanger, and others where it is not. The reality is that it feels so good at the front of the room that you want to be doing it constantly as a teacher. However, it is a tool to be used alongside other forms of participation, such as mini-whiteboards. Explanations with checks for listening turn into energy-filled moments of engagement, whereas recall and checks for understanding work more efficiently with mini-whiteboards.

Please go and read this blog that inspired this:

https://bunsenblue.wordpress.com/2023/04/08/checks-for-listening-100-participation/