LEARNING WITH CASE STUDIES
PRACTICAL APPROACHES TO THE LARGE
CLASS CHALLENGE (ARTICLE 2):
A Practical Example – Determining the Way Forward for
Halvey’s Bakery
John Doran, Margaret Healy, Maeve McCutcheon &
Steve O’Callaghan
University College Cork, Ireland
Enabling student learning via case-based
teaching in large classes can challenge many
educators. This article documents one
example of addressing those challenges,
describing how the authors structured the
learning activities and assessment tasks.
Teaching with case studies in large class settings
can pose many challenges. However, the
opportunities given to students for active
participation, collective learning and peer interaction
can make the extra effort required from the lecturer
worthwhile. In an earlier article1 a number of
practical approaches to addressing the challenges
of learning with case studies in large class settings
were presented and discussed. This article provides
an example of these approaches being put into
practice. The example provided also forms part of a
larger action research project, funded by the Irish
Accountancy Education Trust.
The case chosen, “Halvey’s Bakery”2, addressed the
management accounting topics of activity-based
and traditional absorption costing systems. The
context is a family business at a strategic turning
point in its history. Alternative calculations of product
costs are to be used for decisions on both the
commercial viability of a contract and of outsourcing
production. Intertwined with these choices, the case
allows for consideration of emerging management
succession issues within the business.
To capture this in an interesting but manageable
format, students were given the task of acting as
members of a family business council to determine
“the way forward” for the bakery. This format was
chosen to provide novelty and draw the students
into the case study.
Prior to the use of the case in class, students had
been taught the principles of activity-based and
absorption costing systems and, so, were familiar
with how to approach the calculative aspects
required in the case. Two weeks prior to the class,
students were given a handout describing how the
case analysis process and associated assessment
points would be structured, providing clear
directions as to what was expected at each stage.
The class consisted of 72 students. The first
objective was that the students prepare the case in
advance of the class and engage in small group
discussion. Therefore, each student was allocated
to one of 24 groups of three. The second objective
was to provide for a lively, in-class discussion where
all students would participate in a family council
meeting. For this reason, each small group analysed
the case from one of four distinct perspectives (see
Table 1, overleaf). The combination of these
differing perspectives would provide the basis for
the discussion.
Prior to the case study class, each group of three
was instructed to meet, and working from the point
of view of their case character’s perspective, decide
on three main issues that needed to be addressed
and decided upon at the upcoming family council
meeting. The groups were required to e-mail their
identified issues to the lecturer. This was the first
assessment point. The issues received were then
made available to all students prior to the case
study class using Blackboard (the Virtual Learning
Environment - VLE). Sharing the different group
outputs in this way was designed to facilitate peer
learning. (The names of contributors were removed
and no comment was made by the lecturer on the
standard of contribution from individual groups at
this point).
Six family councils in total were constructed,
consisting of four smaller groups representing each
of the four different perspectives. The distribution of
the small groups among the council meetings had
been pre-allocated in the initial handout, minimising
arrangements necessary on the day of the class.
The total time available for the case class was two
hours. In the first hour students engaged in a family
council meeting. The six councils met in parallel in
the same room. Immediately prior to the start of
class the lecturer marked out physical spaces within
the lecture room for each council. Students very
quickly transformed their designated space to
Practical Approaches To The Large Class Challenge (Article 2): A Practical Example
3
Table 1: Small Group – Pre-class activity
Perspective
Role in Case
Statement of Position
John’s position
Son of bakery founders; not involved in
the business; Trainee chartered
accountant
“We should outsource production of the
speciality breads contract”
Noleen’s position
Daughter of the bakery founders; trained
as a chef; growing profile as ‘celebrity
chef’; some involvement in the business
“This contract is the way forward”
Annie & Denis’ position
Founders of the business; parents of John “This company must provide for our
and Noleen; seeking to retire
retirement”
External Family Advisor
position
External advisor; not mentioned in the
case context
facilitate their family council meeting. Students had
been given the objectives and protocol for the family
council meetings in advance. These were as shown
in Table 2 (below).
Students quickly became engaged in animated and
enthusiastic discussion across all the groups. As the
objective was to determine a way forward,
contributions from all four perspectives were
needed. The requirement to produce two slides
motivated the observers to assimilate the
“The Family needs to agree on the best
way forward”
contributions of their fellow students, with individuals
actively canvassing for a stronger representation of
their particular perspective. There was a genuine
sense of each student having a voice in the process
and being able to express a viewpoint or counter
argument to other propositions. While dominant
students may initially have controlled the discussion
in some of the family councils, the nature of the task
demanded that all group members participate. The
smaller setting of a group of twelve (rather than the
larger class as a whole) facilitated this.
Table 2: Protocol for Family Council Meetings
• The objective of the family council meeting is to determine “a way forward” for Halvey’s Bakery.
• Two members of each group of three (i.e. two ‘John’s; two ‘Noleen’s, etc) are to represent that perspective at the
family meeting.
• The third member is to act as an observer/rapporteur.
• Each council elects its own Chair.
• The meeting should last no longer than 30 minutes.
• At the end of the meeting, the four observers at each council collectively produce two acetate slides: (1) recording the
outcome of the meeting; and (2) suggesting a way forward based on the content and discussion.
• Slides are to be given to lecturer at the end of the first hour.
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Practical Approaches To The Large Class Challenge (Article 2): A Practical Example
Table 3: Summary of case learning process
Essential components
Practical Application
Choose a case that is relevant, rich and
interesting
Case chosen: Halvey’s Bakery, Case # 18, from Hyndman &
McKillop (2006).
A family business at a cross-roads in both business issues
(choice of costing system; commercial implications of a
proposed supermarket contract; option to outsource production)
and family issues (a lack of succession planning).
Ensure students read the case in advance
Clear directions in advance: Two weeks prior to the case
class a detailed handout was circulated to all students and
reviewed in class. An initial task was assigned to students to be
completed in advance of the case class.
Small group analysis (pre-class) and diffusion of
results
Pre-class activity: Students in small groups of 3 prepared the
case from a single character’s perspective. Each small group
identified the three main issues for their designated role and emailed these to the lecturer, who collated all the responses and
posted them to Blackboard (VLE for the module).
Creation of an opportunity for peer learning: By making the
output of each group available electronically to the class as a
whole, prior to the case study class.
Discussion of, and defence of, analysis in class
In-class activity:
Stage 1: Concurrent family council meetings were held during
the first hour. Each student had a designated role with the
marks awarded for the output (a two-slide presentation) being
given to all council members.
Stage 2: Presentation of ‘The Way Forward’, as determined by
each of the individual Family Councils, presented to the class
as a whole.
Large class discussion, moving from the
particulars of the case, to the general issue(s)
under consideration
In class activity:
Full class discussion of the alternatives proposed by
individual Family Council groups was facilitated by the lecturer.
The slides from each group were posted to Blackboard
immediately following the class.
Peer evaluation: students were asked to (anonymously)
evaluate each presentation.
Appropriate assessment
Pre class activity:
Small group analysis of case from single perspective.
In class activity:
Presentation of outputs of Family Council meetings.
Post class activity:
Individual case-based examination
Practical Approaches To The Large Class Challenge (Article 2): A Practical Example
5
Constraints envisaged on the part of the lecturer in
terms of the built environment of a standard lecture
room appeared to have little impact on students,
who willingly arranged and re-arranged the furniture
to suit the purposes of the particular task at hand.
The second hour of the scheduled class time was
allocated to family council presentations and full
class discussion of the outputs. The members of
each of the observer groups were allocated a
maximum of five minutes to present the outcome of
their meeting, using their slides. This was the
second assessment point. The groups did not have
access to their slides prior to presenting. Thus
attention was focused on the presentations from the
other groups, rather than on adding to or amending
slides. Students were supportive of each other,
paying attention to each presentation and rewarding
the presenters with a round of applause on
conclusion.
Peer evaluation in the form of an anonymous survey
was conducted at this point. Each student was
asked to score each presentation based on the
visual impact of their slides, the presentation
content, and the presentation delivery. Students
were asked to identify which meeting they
themselves were part of, allowing the lecturer to
determine the extent of biased voting. Despite no
marks being available for this aspect of the process,
students were engaged and were interested in
finding out the ‘winner’. When the effect of awarding
top marks to the presenters from their own family
council was eliminated from the scoring, the level of
consensus amongst the class was very high.
Full class discussion, moving from the particulars of
the case to the general issues under consideration,
was led by the lecturer. Feedback was provided at
this point with positive aspects of each presentation
being highlighted as were areas in need of greater
attention. Students were also invited to ask
questions of either the lecturer or of other groups.
6
Immediately following the case class the lecturer
posted the slides from each presentation to
Blackboard along with some general comments and
advice. The final assessment point was an individual
written examination based on the case context
which was scheduled for the following week. This
examination presented the students with revised
and additional information in relation to the Bakery’s
business options, its product costs and costing
systems. Students were asked to address questions
based on both the initial analysis completed in class
and the additional information presented in the
examination.
Table 3 (page 5) summarises each of the aspects of
the case learning process described in the previous
paragraphs.
While the process appears to be complicated, most
of the effort was in setting it up. Once the protocol
had been established and explained to the students,
the learning activities in the class ran very smoothly.
Feedback from the lecturer and students, as well as
observations of the process as part of the larger
action research project, indicated that it proved a
worthwhile learning experience, which students
valued and which the lecturer would willingly
engaged in again.
The authors gratefully acknowledge the support of
the Irish Accountancy Education Trust.
1 “Learning with Case Studies: Practical Approaches to the Large
Class Challenge” by John Doran, Margaret Healy, Maeve
McCutcheon and Steve O’Callaghan (Chartered
Accountants Ireland, 2011) – see http://www.chartered
accountants.ie/General/Shop/Books/learning-with-casestudies/
2. ‘Halvey’s Bakery’ by John Doran and Margaret Healy, Case 18
in Cases in Management Accounting and Business
Finance, 2nd Edition (Chartered Accountants Ireland,
2010), Editors: Noel Hyndman and Donal McKillop.
3. A copy of the exact examination paper is available from the
lecturer on request (e-mail: mhealy@afis.ucc.ie).
Practical Approaches To The Large Class Challenge (Article 2): A Practical Example
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