During much of the program, the professors take courses with peers in their field. Day offers the rare course that draws a crowd across disciplines. Day challenges professors to consider their own mental processes as well as those of their students. Rather than being offended by this idea, faculty rethink their teaching assumptions and practices. Afterwards, they often write Day to report their teaching has improved and also to request a follow-up course.
Day offers two cognition and teaching courses.
In Part 1, she covers basic cognitive processes such as perception, attention, memory and comprehension. So far she has taught some 800 professors in the Chautauqua program. She also has presented abbreviated versions to professional organizations like the American Association for the Advancement of Science and the American Association for Higher Education as well as universities and colleges. Since participants usually share the course ideas with colleagues, Day's message likely has reached thousands of college faculty members and their students over the years. Day recently taught the follow-up course at Duke.