Setting a “Do-Now” for students is hardly a new strategy. I remember experiencing them as a student, both in primary and secondary school. When I went through my initial teacher training, in a context and time when “hooks” were seen as a necessary component of a lesson plan, setting a “Do-Now” was considered an easy way to captivate students’ attention and pique their interest in the lesson. So what are they, and why do we use “Do-Now” tasks?

Active ingredients of a “Do-Now”

At first glance, a “Do-Now” is a simple classroom strategy. From the moment the students enter the classroom, the teacher has written the “Do-Now” on the board—it’s usually simple instructions for a task to activate hard thinking (often following the words “Do Now:” to signal to students to indeed, do it now).

But there are a few key ingredients for an effective “Do-Now”. First and foremost, students need to be taught the underlying routine. Typically, this involves the students entering the classroom and starting the “Do-Now” without any further prompts. (Depending on the context, students’ age, and timetable, it could be the final step of a multi-step routine including other steps like hanging up coats, washing hands, or submitting an assignment.)

And, as with any classroom routine, not only must it be taught, it must be reinforced, embedded, and perhaps even assessed. The students should not be surprised when they see a “Do-Now” and should know to quickly follow their routine, with minimal prompts.

Such a routine sends a clear message to students: you have now entered a time and place for learning. It’s not after the teacher takes the register and quiets the class—it’s now, from the moment of stepping into the classroom.

Advantages of a “Do-Now” task

“Do-Now” tasks are a great technique to help teachers maximise opportunities to learn, as defined in the Model for Great Teaching (Coe et al., 2020). They start the hard thinking from the moment the students enter the room. They communicate that class time is valuable and should be used effectively; they also signal that whatever was happening before has now concluded.

This also gives teachers a precious few moments to handle the “administrivia” of the classroom—taking the register and attendance, responding to a sudden need of an individual student, or finishing prepping the materials or setup for that lesson (particularly in schools or colleges where teachers and classes change rooms and spaces). The students can be working independently on the task while the teacher is simultaneously completing the necessary details, saving time during the heart of the lesson.

Crucially, when most effective, “Do-Nows” can be more than just a “babysitting” or time-occupying device. They are an opportunity for students to do some “hard thinking” (Dimension 4 of the Model for Great Teaching, Coe et al., 2020). If the task has the aim of “maximising opportunity to learn”, that time needs to be spent effectively; busywork does not hold the same value as a cognitive, curricular task.

Dual purpose “Do-Nows”

At the moment in England (and increasingly elsewhere), Rosenshine’s Principals of Effective Instruction are very popular—and for good reason (Karpicke et al., 2016)! Teachers understand the value of retrieval practice and regularly seek to integrate it into their practice. Often, this occurs at the very start of the lesson; sometimes it happens as the “Do-Now”.

Can a “Do-Now” actually be retrieval practice? The short answer is yes, but there’s an asterisk—terms and conditions may apply!

There are a handful of considerations for effective retrieval practice. One essential active ingredient is that the learners must be retrieving the information from their own long-term memory, not looking up the answer with their notebooks, peers, or internet. And with any task, the students’ attention must be on the task, which should require the right level of “desirable difficulty”.

It follows then, that for a “Do-Now” task to be effective as a retrieval practice task, the expectations for students’ attention and effort should be secure and embedded. In other words, the routine of the “Do-Now” must come first.

Final thoughts

So what does this mean for implementing “Do-Now” tasks in your classroom? I argue that it is absolutely possible for it to serve two purposes!

However, the “active ingredients” which lead to success as a time-maximising technique is really a prerequisite for retrieval practice. In short, only once our learners have a solid “Do-Now” routine embedded for the start of class can we additionally use it as a true retrieval practice task. (And even if we aren’t immediately able to completely faithfully implement them as retrieval practice, they are still effective as an opening routine!)

References

Coe, R., Rauch, C.J., Kime, S. & Singleton, D. (2020). Great Teaching Toolkit: Evidence review. Evidence Based Education. https://evidencebased.education/reports/

Karpicke, J. D., Blunt, J. R., & Smith, M. A. (2016). Retrieval-based learning: Positive effects of retrieval practice in elementary school children. Frontiers in Psychology, 7. https://doi.org/10.3389/fpsyg.2016.00350