Teaching a class the second time is different

The content for my Game Industry Survey class today was identical to what it was in the Fall.

On my Fall notes, I have in my own hastily-scribbled handwriting for Lecture #5: "I thought this would take a lot of time so I rushed through it, and ended up an hour short." This time, knowing better, I didn't bother rushing. I had plenty of time -- an extra hour in a two-hour class!

The students had other ideas. We got into a class discussion on ESRB ratings and the responsibility of retailers (and parents and legislators); and another discussion on whether rentals were good or bad for the industry as a whole, and how they changed the business decisions of what games got funded. Great stuff, and very much on topic, but neither of these topics were brought up by students in the Fall.

Between these debates and my relaxed pace we only had ten minutes left at the end to play Guitar Hero, and we never got to watch the awesome developer interviews on the disc (or look at the Accordion Hero website) -- I'll have to save those for next time. So much for relying on my notes from last time; the students are different, and therefore, so is the course!