I think it is different, or, at least, it can be. I went to a small college, with class sizes maxed out at 25 or 30, and frequently having less than that. My introductory linguistics class had six students, as I recall, and our "classroom" was usually sitting around a conference table discussing.

One of the more popular classes (and thus regularly "packed" with 25 students) was a U.S. history class taught by a certain professor. He clearly had all of the material pre-planned in advance, but he was such a fascinating speaker to listen to that the material didn't come across as dry and bland. He was the sort of instructor that ought to make lecture recordings for students elsewhere to listen to.