The Harvard Family Research Project separated from the Harvard Graduate School of Education to become the Global Family Research Project as of January 1, 2017. It is no longer affiliated with Harvard University.

Terms of Use ▼

• Permission to Use Materials: In consideration for your agreement to the terms and conditions contained here, the President and Fellows of Harvard College, c/o the Harvard Graduate School of Education, grant you a personal, non-exclusive, non-transferable license to access and use Harvard Family Research Project publications hosted on the Global Family Research Project Site.
• User may download material from the Site only for User's own personal, non-commercial use. User may not otherwise copy, reproduce, retransmit, distribute, publish, commercially exploit or otherwise transfer any material. The burden of determining that use of any information, software or any other content on the Site is permissible rests with User.
• User will seek permission or licensing for any commercial use requests from the Harvard Graduate School of Education Office of Sponsored Projects.

• Home
• Research Areas
  • Complementary Learning
  • Family Involvement
  • Out-of-School Time
  • Early Childhood Education
  • Evaluation
  • Other Research Areas
• Publications & Resources
  • Search Publications
  • Browse Our Publications
  • Publications Series
  • Copyright and Reprint Permissions
• HFRP News
  • News & Announcements
  • Blog: New Directions in Family Engagement
  • In the Media

• Complementary Learning
• Family Involvement
  • Overview
  • Professional Development
  • Informing Family Engagement Policy
  • FINE: Family Involvement Network of Educators
  • Projects
  • Publications & Resources
• Out-of-School Time
• Early Childhood Education
• Evaluation
• Other Research Areas

• Large text size
• Normal text size
• Small text size
• Print this page

Step 4 in the Create Your Own Case Toolkit is to develop your case structure. Read more about this step and complete a series of exercises designed to help you develop a case outline.

INTRODUCTION:
Up until this point, you’ve been developing the building blocks for your case. In this step, you will develop a timeline of events for your case, and structure—or outline—them in a logical, cohesive, and interesting way. There are different options for doing this.

READ:
Case 6: The Real Meaning of Back to School Night, by Rabeya Akther. From the back story, readers might incorrectly assume that the mother is not engaged in her children’s learning and is unwilling to make an effort to attend back to school night. The “twist”—the mismatch—that needs to be addressed relates to the fact that the mother has not had an opportunity to fully understand the importance of the event. Through the support and encouragement of an outreach worker, the mother develops an understanding of the U.S. School system that leads her to take a leadership role in the school.

COMPLETE:
Exercises 4.1 and 4.2. These exercises are designed to help you structure your case so that it unfolds as an engaging story with a mismatch that needs to be addressed. 

• Exercise 4.1: Developing Your Case Structure, provides a linear story outline that you can complete to help guide you as you develop your case. 

• Exercise 4.2: Structuring Your Case Around the “Back Story” and the “Full Story,” is designed to help you convert your case into a two-pronged story structure. 

THINK ABOUT:
When you’ve completed exercises 4.1 and 4.2, ask yourself: How do the structure and organization of my case help readers grapple with my main messages?

You might want to adopt the structure of the back story and full story, as described here and as the authors have done in the Case Collection. However, you might instead decide that it is better to tell your case in sequential order, leaving out the resolution. Another approach would be to start your case in the present, move to the past, and then move back to the present.

Previous Step

Create Your Own Case Toolkit

Next Step