Central to a student-centered classroom are activities that draw real information from students. The student questionnaire that I give on the first day of class settles students down immediately and gives them the all-important “something to do” in the first few minutes of the school year. But the information they provide is also the inspiration of countless activities in the first weeks of school. I’m never going into a card talk completely blind, because I have already skimmed through the questionnaires and found something I can fall back on if the class is silent.