In a 10-week cycle at our school, we will have, usually, 19 two-hour class meetings. Each cycle there are two holidays; one will fall on a Monday (or Wednesday, as in Thanksgiving eve)and the other will fall on a Thursday (or Tuesday, to allow for a long weekend. Thus the 19 meetings. I say all that to say this: It seems to me a small investment of your class time to spend one full class period covering syllabus, textbook and class requirements, and getting to know each other. Some of my colleagues try to limit the getting-to-know-you portion of the class meeting to one hour, then start introducing course content the second hour. I find it's time well spent learning as much as we can about each other right away; that way, when we start on course content, we're all generally comfortable with where we are all going together, and how we're going to get there. It also helps those second-day adds or dirst-day-absents keep from falling too far behind the first day. John