Classrooms can looks so big when they are empty. And then, when the students arrive
they somehow seem both bigger and smaller,
with a lot less air, but a ton of energy, especially on day 1 in a freshman-dominated class.
The first session went well I thought. A few technical difficulties with the cell phone polling technology (it might not be able to cope with 350 students texting in at the same time), and it always takes me some time to get used to the inertia of large classes (slow to start laughing, slow to stop). Most amazing to me was to see the students more riveted watching a video of me than they were watching me. Not sure whether that says something about me or the modern age. Whatever, it was an experiment I tried, and it worked. A keeper.