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What is the case method? How can the case method be used to engage learners? What are some strategies for getting started? This guide helps instructors answer these questions by providing an overview of the case method while highlighting learner-centered and digitally-enhanced approaches to teaching with the case method.
Unlike lectures, case method classes unfold without a detailed script. Successful instructors simultaneously manage content and process, and they must prepare rigorously for both. Case method teachers learn to balance planning and spontaneity.
To assist both experienced and new case-method teachers, each case has its own teaching plan: a flexible road-map for the instructor that suggests specific questions, strategies for eliciting key insights, and ideas for organizing student responses visually on a blackboard.
In this introductory guide to teaching with cases we'll ask why teach with cases, explore how to preparing for case teaching, and introduce some tools and techniques.
Through an incremental process of preparation, practice, self-reflection, and peer and student feedback, instructors find that the case method allows their knowledge of, and passion for, their field of expertise to inspire and transform their students and themselves.
Most case assignments require students to answer an open-ended question or develop a solution to an open-ended problem with multiple potential solutions. Requirements can range from a one-paragraph answer to a fully developed group action plan, proposal or decision.
The case method is an effective way to increase student engagement and challenge students to integrate and apply skills to real-world problems. In these videos, Using the Case Method to Teach Public Policy, you'll find invaluable insights into the art of case teaching from one of HKS’s most respected professors, Jose A. Gomez-Ibanez.
