Weird Teaching Dynamics

I teach two days a week, both in the morning, both the same undergraduate introductory class, and one right after the other. I'm never quite prepared for the first class. I always need one chance to go through eveything, and when I do, then I feel ready. So the first class becomes my practice and the second becomes the real one. If students are equally likely to enroll in each class, then it means the differences in the class experiences are due to the fact that I teach a better class in the second period than the first. I notice that the first period students are really unengaged. It's 9:30, so maybe it's the hour, but I don't think so. I think it's because that class feels a little worse than the second, which feels really great. The first period's students seemed sometimes annoyed and lethargic, and the second period's students literally cannot get enough. Today they even asked me to keep lecturing, despite class being over. Do you know how easy it is to get people that interested in the calculation of the consumer price index that they actually want you to keep going? Not easy, let me tell you. Not easy for the instructor to get excited, let alone 30 non-majors.

Well, I started thinking the other day that small differences in experience start to compound over time for the students - a momentum ends up building. Students come in with the knowledge the previous classes had been really lame, and they expect this one to be lame too. The others come in with the memory of how great the class has been going, and they expect it to be the same today, and so they're more involved, interested, excited. This momentum is new to me. I've never taught two classes at the same time, same day, back to back. But I think it's probably an important dynamic. I'll be surprised if the class evals aren't significantly better for the second class than the first. But, I also need to figure out a way to make the first class much better. I've got to get them involved in lecture more. Our first test is on Tuesday, which is usually when the honeymoon ends and students realize what a jerk I can be.