Teaching Routines / Quiz & Swap
Quiz and Swap
Everybody holds one question card. You quiz a partner, they quiz you, you swap cards and go and find somebody else, so the whole class is teaching each other one fact at a time, on their feet.
A timer for each stage, with what the children do in each · free to try · free to start
The sheet it prints (optional)
What is quiz and swap?
Quiz and swap is a cooperative structure in which every child holds a card with a question on one side and its answer on the other. They pair up, quiz each other, swap cards, and find a new partner. Repeat for a few minutes and every child has answered and asked a dozen questions.
What makes it more than a quiz is that each child is momentarily the expert: they hold the answer, so they are the one who confirms, corrects and explains. Being the person who knows is a different experience from being the person asked.
How do you run quiz and swap, step by step?
- Get a card (about thirty seconds). One card each. Read both sides. Nobody can quiz from a card they have not read.
- Rounds (about forty seconds each). Hand up, find a partner, ask your question, then answer theirs. If they are stuck, give the clue rather than the answer. At the chime the board says swap: trade cards, find somebody new, and you press Next round.
Five or six rounds is about four minutes. The swap is the part that gets skipped and it is what stops the activity being one question repeated twelve times.
Where do the cards come from?
Make them once and use them for years. The most efficient version is to have the class write them: give every child a blank card, they write a question and its answer, you check them as you collect them in.
Set how many children you have and the cards print for the whole class, eight to a page. Cut along the dashed lines and fold on the dotted line: the question is on the front, and the answer is on the back with a line for a clue, so a partner who is stuck gets a nudge instead of the answer. Writing the cards is itself a decent retrieval task, and it means the set is in their own words.
Short of time? In Set up the cards, type a topic and press Write them for me. It writes a card for each child, each with its answer and a clue, and you can change any of them before they print. It uses 1 token on the free plan.
Checking the cards before you use them is not optional and I learned that the hard way. My first class-written set had four cards with the wrong answer on the back, and those four wrong answers propagated round thirty children in about six minutes, being confidently confirmed each time by whoever was holding the card. Now I read every card as I collect it. The other thing worth doing is a hand-up signal for finding a partner: hand up means I need somebody, hands down means we are quizzing. Without it you get the same friends pairing repeatedly and a couple of children wandering with nobody to go to, which is miserable if it is you. With Year 5 I now also colour the cards by topic so I can tell at a glance whether the room has drifted onto one area.
What usually goes wrong?
- A wrong answer on a card gets taught to the whole class. Check every card first.
- The same pairs keep meeting. Use a hands-up signal so it is obvious who is free.
- Nobody swaps cards, so it is one question over and over. Say it, and check as you circulate.
- Cards are too hard to answer in ten seconds, and the pace dies.
Which year groups is it for?
| Year group | US grade | What to change | How long |
|---|---|---|---|
| Years 1–2 | K – Grade 1 | Pictures on the cards. You write them, not the class. | 3 min |
| Years 3–4 | Grades 2–3 | Class writes the cards, you check them. Add the hands-up signal. | 4 min |
| Years 5–6 and up | Grades 4–8 | Require a follow-up “why?” on every card, not just a fact. | 6 min |
Compared with the other retrieval structures
- Retrieval Practice as a technique covers the same ground sitting down, in silence, and with no partner to correct you.
- Give One, Get One trades ideas rather than testing facts: same movement, different job.
- Back & Forth is what to use when you want volume from a pair rather than circulation round the room.
Free to try · free to start · the sheet is optional
Written by a practising primary school teacher, and part of the free-to-try Teaching Routines set on Sage Teachers. Last checked August 2026. Everything here is free to try.