Last year’s post during add/drop (or “course shopping”) period emphasized some of the common annoyances that can crop up during the first week or two of the semester. My absolute favorite part of add/drop, however, is that many students don’t appear to realize that their presence in the course is visible. So, for example, a student will add a MWF class on Tuesday, and then show up the *next* Monday and ask for a syllabus, claiming “I just added the class.” I used to teach at a school that showed you the date on which a student added the class, which made it even more fun, since you could call up the evidence right there. Good times.
Regardless of whether you see add/drop as an annoyance to be lived with, as something to be carefully weighed, or as something comically to be exploited, add/drop is a challenge to course design: given a certain amount of fluidity in your course roster, is it worth it to teach significant concepts straightaway at the start of the semester? By the same token, if the semester’s first week is an exercise in throat-clearing, waiting for the roster to settle, then you’re just wasting time. (Plus, you’re somewhat defeating a goal of add/drop, which is to help students figure out if the course is appropriate for them.)
I have ended up splitting the difference: On the one hand, I can’t stomach waiting around for the roster to settle. It’s like holding up a meeting, waiting to see if anyone else turns up. The class is what it is. On the other hand, if the course launches immediately into a substantive assignment, then it’s just extra work to get new students caught up. And who needs that, you know? For the first few classes, then, I tend to offer reduced/different reading assignments--for example, in a Victorian novel class, perhaps a couple of short poems that introduce key terms or debates in the period--that will provide some common orientation for the rest of the semester. New students can get the material from the common class notes, and then, by the time add/drop’s over, we’re all ready for the first long(ish) novel. And as a bonus, students in the class from the beginning have a chance to get ahead with the reading.
While I’ve viewed this development mostly with crankiness, and as a compromise to an overlong period of ambiguity, the reality is that it has probably helped my classes, by scaffolding the material in a more explicit and (let’s face it) pre-digested way.
What about you? When you design your syllabus, do you plan for add/drop? How is it different in your discipline?
Image by Flickr user Robert Couse-Baker / Creative Commons licensed
