Opening Statements - Case Notes

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Author - John Shepherd - Spring 1998

I have used this case twice as an opening for the course. This spring I used it over two 50 minute periods. I think it would do well as a 75 minute class and then part of the following meeting.

Day 1. I started the students out in 4 groups of 6, with students mixed by major and academic background (GPA or SAT). After introductions, each one is given the list of statements. The following lists have been used:

• Shepherd's Fall 1997 list
• Shepherd's Spring 1998 list
• Huber's Spring 1998 list

The class proceeds as follows:

1. Each student is asked to rank the statements in 10 minutes.
2. They are then given 5-10 minutes to describe the criteria they used to put some of the statements at the top of the list and others at the bottom.
3. Each student group is asked to discuss the statements and to try to reach a consensus on their ranking. This will take at least 15 minutes.
4. I compare the ranks from the student groups on the board and try to generalize about the kinds of statements they saw in the list.
5. I passed out the Six Ways We Get Values handout. For homework, they wrote two statements that were examples of each of the categories. I also asked them to write a paragraph that described the differences between the criteria they had used and those used by others in their group.

Day 2. Student groups were asked to put each of my opening statements into one or more of the categories in the Six Ways handout. We then compared notes and talked about the ways the 4 groups had treated the statements. For example, some argued that statements of faith were examples of "accepted atuhority" while others thought this could be personalized an "emotional truth" or "intuition." Some groups made the distinction between the way they accepted authority for scientific facts although scientists would treat them as matters of logic, etc.

I ended the class by trying to relate their observations to the course goals of identifying science as a human intellectual perspective.