What is it about small groups that make them so powerful? The answer is straightforward: Groups tend to solve problems better than even the brightest individuals because "many hands make light work," and "two heads are better than one." This is especially true when the groups are diverse and individuals act somewhat independently. In this month's…

Case study teaching had a long tradition in law and business before it made the jump to medical school education in the form of Problem-Based Learning (PBL) in the 1970s. Today, both the University of Delaware's Clearinghouse and the University of Buffalo's National Center for Case Study Teaching in Science (NCCSTS) have hundreds of cases and…

Reviews the origin of problem based learning (PBL) and variations of PBL. Suggests that PBL is simply one way of case study learning. (Author/KHR)

In this article, the author discusses how to properly implement a case study. Specifically, he discusses how much information should be put into a case study. The author suggests to clearly know what the goals of a case study are before starting to write it. He states that in most cases, the straightforward approach without contradictions poses…