Teaching Introduction to Lit. Studies

As the semester winds down, I start thinking about how I would do things differently. In my Introduction to Literary Studies, which I taught for the first time, I used Aproximaciones and pretty much followed the organization of the book: Narrativa, Poesía, Drama. I think that next time I teach the course I will begin with poetry and spend more time on it than the other genres, since it seems to me that poetic language is part and parcel of good literature. I also think I would proceed in reverse chronological order, dealing with the Siglo de Oro/Baroque last, since it is more challenging and I think it would be good for students to become accustomed to poetry before diving into Garcilaso or Sor Juana. I did ask students to memorize and recite a poem this semester, though.

Any thoughts? Have you used other textbooks worth recommending?

Making Time for Research

As the new semester begins I find myself reassessing my time management. I know many "teacher-scholars" from large state institutions do the lion's share of research during the summer, due to high teaching and service loads, but do any of you have any tricks for streamlining class prep in order to free up more time for research and writing?