Students travel back in time to 19th-century Japan, assuming the roles of advisors to the Tokugawa shogunate. They must synthesize primary readings on social and political unrest to propose reforms that could prevent the regime from collapsing.
In this simulation activity, students decide which of two companies, each using a different CRISPR genome-editing technology, to invest in. They engage with research on CRISPR genome editing to understand how unintended consequences of one technology used for this editing had real-world business implications. The storytelling element adds immediacy to the activity, making it imaginative and engaging, and students are pushed toward achieving higher levels of competence within Bloom’s taxonomy for the subject area.
Faculty develop a national security crisis and simulate placing the students on the National Security Council Staff to develop strategic options to drive U.S. foreign policy. By thrusting students into positions of responsibility for solutions to real-world issues, this activity requires students to draw on what they have learned and to think on their feet, and it fosters a deeper appreciation for the challenges associated with working on foreign policy.
Through this activity, students were challenged to think critically about the rhetoric which drove the events of the Peloponnesian war.... Read more about Micropolitan Dialogue
This activity teaches skills in critical assessment of the peer-reviewed published literature. It focuses on analysis of clinical trials in mental health, but the principles and methods are readily generalizable to other scientific literature. The “Smackdown” approach represents an augmentation of the traditional “journal club” mode of teaching critical scientific reading skills.
In this activity, students debated topics in science and technology from the perspective of a stakeholder during a particular period in 20th century American history. While this structure was used for all three debates, this posting will draw from one debate in particular, the 1923 immigration committee role play.
In this activity, students will have an opportunity to debate current controversial issues in biotechnology from the point of view of a stakeholder group.
In this class simulation of a crisis event, students role play as different actors of the US government. They have to collaborate with different actors to formulate an optimal response strategy that is made public in a press conference.
This debate about whether judicial review is compatible with democracy is meant to get students thinking about what sort of ideal democracy is, and to see both its procedural and substantive components.
For her sixth section, Kirstin Woody Scott prepared this activity based off of the HMS/BWH case study on Bangladesh Rural Advancement Committee and tuberculosis. This activity allowed students to discuss and present the knowledge of the case they had reviewed in lecture and tackle policy realities in global health. Students prepared oral arguments to take on the role of different stakeholders and defend their positions when faced with cuts to global health funding.
For one activity used in SW24: Global Health Challenges, students participate in a simulation of groups proposing grants to a funding agency to deal with a humanitarian crisis.
In History of Science course "Brainwashing and Modern Techniques of Mind Control," students participate in a role play to debate the legality of torture and other types of coercive interrogation.