Starting a new class tips

• Start with a bang! Fill the first day of class with substantial content.

• Hand out an informative, artistic, and user-friendly syllabus.

• Give an assignment on the first day to be collected at the next lesson.

• Call attention (written and oral) to what makes good class practice: completing work to be done, procedures, equipment, clean up, maintenance, safety, conservation of supplies, full use of class time.

• Tell students how much time they will need to study for this course.

• Hand out supplemental study aids: library use, study tips, supplemental readings and exercises.

• Explain how to study for the kind of tests you give.

• Put in writing a limited number of ground rules regarding absence, late work, testing procedures, grading, and general decorum, and maintain these.

• Ask students to write about what important things are currently going on in their lives.