At 8 a.m. in the Forum a beach ball is launched into a mass of psychology students clad in hoodies and holding coffee cups.

Andrew Peck, a senior psychology lecturer, said he thinks that even though his introductory psychology class is large, it's important to make it as personal as possible.

The fall semester is only five weeks in, but many Penn State students are already busy scheduling for the spring, and many will enroll in large classes like Peck's Psychology 002 (Psychology) class.

According to Penn State's Office of the Registrar, Psychology 002 is third on the list of this fall's most-enrolled courses at Penn State. Only Economics 2 (Introductory Microeconomics Analysis and Policy) and English 015 (Rhetoric and Composition) have more students.

Peck has more than 330 students this semester but teaches just one of the seven Psychology 002 class sections this fall.

Despite the class size, Peck said his goal is to make a classroom climate where everyone can feel comfortable.

"In a 75-minute class, if you hear someone lecture for the full 75 minutes, everyone gets sick of hearing my voice, including me," Peck said. "I try and take the application approach like having debates or doing activities to make things stay interesting."

With more than 2,600 students this fall, Economics 002 is the most-enrolled class at Penn State.

Economics Lecturer Norman Clifford said many students are required to take the introductory class as a requirement of their major, which is part of the reason why enrollment in the class is consistently high. "One of the things I like to do is to encourage interaction within the class," Clifford said. "You're not going to get everyone involved, but if you get enough students to talk it really helps make the class."

Most Economics 002 classes allow about 370 students per class, and Clifford said enrollment usually reaches maximum capacity unless a class takes place at a bad time.

Economics 002 Lecturer G. Dirk Mateer said he likes teaching large classes and the learning environment makes or breaks the class.

"I look at it like going to a Penn State football game," he said. "It's so much better to watch football with 106,000 people. A lecture hall is like that too, because it can either be deadly awful because something's killing the enthusiasm or so interesting that everyone wants to take it in and explore it."

Clifford also credits his colleagues' teaching abilities for the success of the department. "We also have teachers like [Mark] McLeod and Mateer who are like polar opposites in the classroom," he said. "But they're both really great which shows there's more than one way to teach this and be successful both ways."

Kimberly Cendan (junior-journalism) said Peck made her 8 a.m. walk to the forum every Tuesday and Thursday bearable. "I thought about dropping it before it even started," she said. "But I went to the first class and liked him so much I decided it'd be worth waking up to stay in the class. He's an amazing teacher and he makes every single class so much fun."

Cendan said she really appreciated his effort to make the class about real life events and not just the textbook.

Peck said he tells his students to think of the class as a museum and him as their tour guide. "I say to them we're going to tour a bunch of different exhibits," he said. "Then, depending on what they're interested in, I might stay in one place a little longer."