Excerpt:
ALTHOUGH the case method has been used for years to teach law, business, and medicine, it is not common in science. Yet the use of case studies holds great promise as a pedagogical technique for teaching science, particularly to undergraduates, because it humanizes science and well illustrates scientific methodology and values. It develops students’ skills in group learning, speaking, and critical thinking, and since many of the best cases are based on contemporary—and often contentious—science problems that students encounter in the news (such as human cloning), the use of cases in the classroom makes science relevant.
Annotation:
This site promotes the use of case studies in the teaching of science, something that the authors claim is not yet common. While the site is not particularly historically oriented, some of the case studies they present for use in a classroom are drawn from the history of science, technology and medicine. For instance, there is a short case study of an appearance of "childbed fever" in the nineteenth century and how doctors discovered and understood the disease. All of these case studies are accesible; intended for a junior high, high school or college audience. Concentrating on teaching contemporary scientific fields to students, this site also contains some links to other case study sites and general sites that may focus on the history of science.