## Key Ideas > [!abstract] Core Concepts > > - **Preview Information**: Call on students when you know how they'll likely respond based on prior data > - **Strategic Selection**: Choose responses that serve specific purposes - confidence building, misconception addressing, method sharing > - **Balance with Cold Call**: Maintain 70% Warm Call for strategy, 30% Cold Call for unpredictability ## Definition **Warm Call**: Strategic variation of Cold-Call where you have collected information on how students will likely respond before calling on them, enabling purposeful selection of responses to share. ## Connected To [[Cold-Call]] | [[Responsive Teaching]] | [[Mini-Whiteboards]] | [[Turn and Talk]] | [[Culture of Error]] | [[Participation]] --- ## The key difference Warm call differs from cold call in that the teacher has collected information on how students will likely respond before calling on them. Cold call uses random sampling to maintain accountability, attention, and representative sampling. Warm call uses preview information for strategic selection, confidence building, and targeted teaching, whilst maintaining the participation benefits of calling on non-volunteers. ## How to gather preview information Preview information comes from deliberate data gathering throughout the lesson, not guesswork or assumptions. During lessons, mini-whiteboards provide written responses from all students, revealing misconceptions, correct methods, and partial understanding. Diagnostic questions with ABCD cards show who chose each distractor. Circulation reveals work in books and problem-solving approaches, allowing teachers to observe different methods and identify struggles. Turn and talk conversations allow teachers to overhear interesting arguments and misconceptions. Group work provides opportunities to monitor individual contributions and understanding. Preview information also comes from previous lessons. Do Now responses build on previous learning. Homework results reveal who struggled with which concepts, allowing targeted support and success opportunities. Assessment data from recent quizzes or tests enables strategic confidence building. Observation notes track patterns of understanding and struggle over time. ## Strategic uses of warm call Warm call allows strategic selection that serves pedagogical purposes rather than leaving sharing to chance. Teachers can choose to highlight common misconceptions to address widespread errors, efficient methods to share better approaches, partial understanding to build from what is correct, or complete solutions to model excellence. After a mini-whiteboard check reveals three different answers (12, 15, and 18), a teacher might call on the student with 15 (correct) to explain the method, the student with 12 to reveal a common mistake, and the student with 18 to address a different misconception. Calling on students when the positive outcome is known can make them feel safe and build their confidence to contribute more in lessons (Lemov, 2015). Success experiences build self-efficacy and create positive associations with participation (Bandura, 1997). Teachers can call on nervous students when they have the correct answer to build positive associations with participation, highlight recently struggling students' success to show improvement and capability, give quiet students moments to shine with correct responses, or follow up after mistakes with questions students can answer to rebuild confidence immediately. If Jamie rarely speaks up and looked uncertain during explanation but has the correct answer during a mini-whiteboard check, this provides an opportunity to boost confidence. Teachers can target errors. Widespread misconceptions can be addressed publicly for the whole class, persistent errors can be connected to previous learning, and interesting wrong answers can be used as learning opportunities. Teachers can showcase variety in approaches by comparing multiple correct methods for efficiency and elegance, highlighting alternative strategies, or showing different representations such as visual, algebraic, and numerical approaches. In the 40-80% understanding scenario (Black & Wiliam, 1998), warm call supports responsive teaching. Teachers can make different responses visible and call on students with each answer to explain their reasoning, allowing the class to examine multiple approaches without the teacher revealing which is correct through selection order. ## Implementation techniques Effective warm call appears natural rather than contrived. Students should experience strategic selection as normal participation, not obvious manipulation. Teachers should avoid obvious patterns by not always calling on correct answers first, mixing confident and uncertain students, and varying between right and wrong responses. Language should be warm and inviting rather than punitive. Warm call works best after data collection through mini-whiteboards, circulation, or group work; during discussions following turn and talk or group activities; for strategic purposes such as confidence building or misconception addressing; and in responsive teaching with 40-80% understanding scenarios. Teachers should stick with cold call when no preview data is available, when genuine randomness is wanted, when testing attention or listening, or when building the expectation that anyone could be called. ## Integration with other strategies Mini-whiteboards and warm call work well together. Teachers can see all responses before calling, choose strategically based on observations, address a range of understanding levels, and highlight good presentation or methods. The process involves students showing mini-whiteboards, the teacher scanning for strategic opportunities, asking students to lower boards but not erase yet, and then using warm call based on what was observed. Turn and talk provides overhearing opportunities. Teachers can listen for interesting discussions whilst circulating, note misconceptions or insights, and call on pairs with useful contributions. With diagnostic questions using ABCD card responses, teachers can see who chose each option, strategically call on different choices, address misconceptions systematically, and build a complete picture of understanding. In responsive teaching scenario 2 (40-80% understanding), warm call allows teachers to make responses visible, call on students with different answers without revealing correctness through selection order, and drive productive discussion. ## Advanced applications When teachers see interesting wrong answers, they can use them to teach the class about common mistakes and show how to check work and catch errors. When different correct approaches emerge, teachers can compare methods and discuss efficiency. Teachers can build confidence progressively, starting with easy questions students can answer, moving to more challenging ones, and eventually using cold call as confidence builds. Effective warm call requires data collection systems such as quick notes during circulation, mini-whiteboard scanning techniques, mental mapping of student responses, and turn and talk monitoring strategies. Decision-making frameworks help teachers determine who needs success for confidence building, what errors need highlighting for misconception addressing, which approaches are worth discussing for method sharing, and what the whole group needs to hear based on class needs. ## Benefits and common pitfalls For students, warm call builds confidence through success experiences and safe environments to share thinking, and enhances learning through targeted misconception addressing, exposure to different methods, and peer learning. For teachers, warm call offers strategic control to choose the most useful responses to share and address learning needs, and diagnostic information to test depth of understanding and verify reasoning behind answers. For classroom culture, warm call makes being called on feel supportive, reduces fear of public mistakes, and builds a culture of error. Common pitfalls include making the pattern too obvious when students realise they are only called when correct, over-using warm call with struggling students by only calling them when correct, ignoring wrong answers by only highlighting correct responses, and becoming predictable when students figure out the pattern. Solutions include mixing warm call with cold call, varying response types called on, balancing confidence-building with challenge, using warm call to address misconceptions, and maintaining some randomness. A recommended split is 70% warm call for strategic, purposeful selection and 30% cold call to maintain unpredictability and attention. ## References Bandura, A. (1997). *Self-efficacy: The exercise of control*. W.H. Freeman. Black, P., & Wiliam, D. (1998). Assessment and classroom learning. *Assessment in Education: Principles, Policy & Practice, 5*(1), 7-74. https://doi.org/10.1080/0969595980050102 Lemov, D. (2015). *Teach like a champion 2.0: 62 techniques that put students on the path to college*. Jossey-Bass.