The Case Study Classroom

I have divided this section into three parts:

1. Case study introduction - deals with the preparation of the case study, the introduction of a problem solving analysis and the pre-teaching of LSP (in this case, I use the example of meeting skills)

2. Case study class - here the class is divided into sections to include meetings, presentations of findings and discussion of recommendations.

3. Debriefing the class - the teacher gives feedback on language mistakes, managerial skills and the meeting documents and support materials used.

1. Case Study Introduction

It is extremely important that the case studies are well prepared in advance so that each student knows what his role is. It is not sufficient just to give the case study to the student and hope that they will understand how to use it. This is the mistake made by many teachers unfamiliar with the case study method. There are many ways of introducing the case study to your students.

Here is a list of steps that should be completed during the case study introduction class.

1) Read the case study thoroughly with your students. Here you can deal with any lexical or grammatical issues. You may also like to ask your students to represent the background information in a visual form. Use the blackboard or flipchart to get a clear picture of the company background. An example is shown in Figure 1. As you can see in this example, the main information is extracted from the case study, which will then be used later for further analysis.

• Company Name

• Elmex-Newton

• Turnover

  • $1.4 m

• Profit in 2001

  • $500 ,000

• Number of Employees

  • 4,800

• Head Office

  • New York

• Product Range

  • White goods

Figure 1. Example of visual representation of background information in a case study

2) Provide the students with some input on how they should analyse the case study. The problem solving analysis below is an example of how to get the students to analyse the case critically.

• a) Read the case several times.

• b) Define the main issues/problems.

• c) Set out the firm’s objectives.

• d) Identify options open to the firm.

• e) Draw up some criteria to evaluate the options chosen.

• f) Select the best option.

• g) Decide on how the option should be implemented.

• h) Draw up an action plan to implement the solution chosen.

3) Pre-teach the language required to discuss the case study. There are many publications on the market for teaching meeting skills, presentation skills or negotiation skills. It is important to select the skill you would like to focus on and teach the specific language. If we take meetings as an example, we could do some of the following:

• refer students to web sites to read up on the skill being practised. A web search will reveal any number of interesting sites.

• If students have access to libraries, then they can read up on meeting skills in one of the many communication books on the market

• brainstorm some key concepts of meetings such as type of meetings, people at a meeting, verbs, etc (see the worksheet in Appendix 1.)

• move on to the language of meetings - provide the students with useful language input for both the chairperson and the participants such as the language of contradicting and disagreeing, interrupting, taking the floor etc.

• familiarise the students with the documents of meeting - the form and content of agendas, minutes and memos. This should provide the student with more language input such as AOB, matters arising out of the last meeting, absentees, etc.

• divide the class into small groups. You can either ask them to form the groups themselves or you can form the groups based on your class lists.

2. Case Study Class

Students should be divided into two small groups (maximum six students) to discuss different aspects of the same case study. Therefore, it is a good idea to find a case study that has two distinct parts. You must remind the students that they do not have all the information they need to solve the case but based on the information available, they can make recommendations and come to preliminary decisions. You can also inform your students that in real life situation in business, we do not have all the facts required to solve a problem.

In a one and a half hour session, the class time is divided into three half hour slots:

• Meeting (30 minutes) - Groups (Group A and Group B) meet to discuss their part of the case study.

• Presentation (15 minutes per group) - Group A present their findings to the other group and vice versa.

• Discussion (30 minutes) - all students come together to discuss the findings and make recommendations.