Seeking and Engaging: Case Study Integration to Enhance Critical Thinking About Agricultural Issues

The agriculture and natural resources (ANR) sectors are facing many complex and controversial issues today, including animal health, biotechnology, climate change, food safety, food security, invasive species, marketing and trade, and water. Undergraduate students, as the future ANR workforce, must...

Full description

Saved in:
Bibliographic Details
Published in:Journal of agricultural education 2019-09, Vol.60 (3), p.97-108
Main Authors: Akins, Jessica L., Lamm, Alexa J., Telg, Ricky, Abrams, Katie, Meyers, Courtney, Raulerson, Becky
Format: Article
Language:English
Subjects:
Agricultural Education
Agricultural industry
Case Method (Teaching Technique)
Case Studies
Climate change
Cognitive Style
College students
Critical Thinking
Education
Food safety
Food supply
Global temperature changes
Information Seeking
Introduced species
Learner Engagement
Marketing
Scores
Teaching
Teaching methods
Undergraduate Students
Citations: Items that cite this one
Online Access:Get full text
Tags: Add Tag
No Tags, Be the first to tag this record!
Description
Summary:The agriculture and natural resources (ANR) sectors are facing many complex and controversial issues today, including animal health, biotechnology, climate change, food safety, food security, invasive species, marketing and trade, and water. Undergraduate students, as the future ANR workforce, must use critical thinking skills to find solutions to these issues. This study sought to determine if a course that integrated case studies, as opposed to a classroom with no case study integration, influenced students’ critical thinking. A pretest/posttest, quasi-experimental research design was used to determine if undergraduate students' critical thinking styles changed as a result of the case study integration. Three undergraduate communication courses focused on issues education at three universities were the sample. Based on the results, students were more willing to seek out information and engage with their peers about the issues facing ANR after the course with the case studies integrated. Case studies should be integrated into the classroom to encourage critical thinking based on these findings. Future research should include investigating the effects of using case studies in other undergraduate courses not focused on issues, in graduate courses, and extension education programs that could determine the effect in a non-formal education setting.
ISSN:1042-0541
1042-0541
DOI:10.5032/jae.2019.03097