Case Studies Teaching Tips

Introduction

These teaching tips accompany the online case studies for Glencoe's Business Management. Each case study illustrates a real-world business situation. The teaching tips are designed to help you focus on key elements. Here are a few things to consider before you start instruction:

• What case studies you will assign for a particular unit? Be sure to carefully read all of the case studies in a unit.
  
  
• Consider the demographics of your class. What interests them? What is their background with business? Their prior knowledge will enable them to understand and relate to concepts in Glencoe's Business Management.
  
  
• What case study ties directly into the text?
  
  
• Decide what case studies will work for small groups, and what case studies should be assigned as individual homework?
  
  
• What case studies can best increase students' awareness on operations? Can the case study (or the ideas it triggers) be tied into something else?

Directions: The time frame to complete a case study varies. For a highly specific case study, you may need 10-15 minutes, especially a case study that could spur conversations on controversial views or role playing.

Make sure to introduce the case studies and allow student to reflect on the concepts. Encourage students to use critical thinking strategies. Perhaps students can form groups to discuss the material. One student can be the group's recorder and another can present to the class the group's ideas. Don't let the same people be in the same group all the time. Rotate them for different viewpoints and group dynamics.

Lesson Goals

These case studies reinforce textual concepts, as well as allowing students to work with real-world problems. Students will learn more about their own intuitive and rational approaches to business management.

Here are some class procedures for each case study:

• Have students carefully read the case study.
  
  
• Ask them to break down the case study into its components.
  

  What are the facts?
  
  What is the background?
  
  How do facts and background tie in with the text? What additional information do they already have that could be useful in understanding the business situation?

• List the problems the business owner/manager/worker faces. Many case studies pose more than one problem. Prioritize the problems and decide the basis in which to prioritize. Should the priority be based on people's feelings? Profits? Timing? What should be tackled first? Why?
  
  
• Discuss the constraints/obstacles that the business manager faces. Which can he or she alter? Which must be factored into the decisions?
  
  
• Identify solutions to the problems that are acceptable within the constraints.
  
  
• Look at pros and cons of the solutions. What are the consequences likely to be? Which course of action will students recommend the business manager follow? Why?
  
  
• Finally, consider whether this particular problem is best approached from a broad, a general, or a specific viewpoint. Or is it a combination of the three? If you pursue this distinction, it can help students understand the difference between the deductive and inductive methods.