roll call
- noun
- /roʊl kɔl/
- The teacher took attendance during the roll call to ensure all students were in class.
- roll call vote
- roll call voting
- roll call analysis
You just showed up for roll call and then you left.
- You just showed up for roll call and then you left.
- And then someone comes in and goes through the roll call, I assume.
- They kicked off prime time tonight with the most fun roll call of all time.
- I remember going to the roll call, walking into the roll call and guys had walked in.
Examples
-
Sunday's intermediate English class began with roll call as my Chinese students pulled out their homework.
Blog text (20) -
Let's do a roll call.
-
You just showed up for roll call and then you left.
-
Been here since roll call.
-
The roll call just started.
-
The teacher continued with her roll call and then immediately began calling on students.
Fiction book (1993) -
We do a roll call to make sure we haven't lost any of you out there.
-
Lefarn started a roll call to learn who was present.
Fiction book (2001) -
So, without further ado, let's begin the roll call.
-
Let's take roll call first and make sure the gang's all here.
Fiction book (2002)
Synonyms
An official list of names kept for record
A quick check where someone calls names to see who is present
To read a list of names aloud to check who is present
A meeting when soldiers line up and have their names called to check who is present
Antonyms
How Official
- Formal
- Jargon
Surface Forms
Morphology
The noun 'roll call' is directly compositional: 'roll' = a roster or list and 'call' = to call out or summon, so the phrase denotes calling the list of names to check presence. This is a common, concrete classroom/meeting procedure and many languages have a comparable construction, so a B1 learner who knows both constituents can reasonably infer the meaning.
Etymology
The phrase roll call comes from the old practice of reading a roll, a list of names on a long piece of paper. People would then call each name out loud to see who was 'present', so today it means checking who is 'present'.