The Nepalese cuisine class project was exceptional. It’s a great way to break it down and explain the component parts. I could see how this might also be interesting in reverse, such as students wanting to open a restaurant with traditional American cuisine in a foreign country, which would allow the students to focus intricately on the foreign culture and what would be most accepted and what dishes would need to be adapted. I have used some similar examples and case studies in my economics classes relating to how corporations, such as McDonald's, have adapted their menu items to local cultural norms.
For a tech savvy class, I could see how this class project could be used to develop an app that might be of broad interest in a foreign country. Students would be required to come up with an app concept, research the economics, cultural, and political realm of the other country, and explain why the app could be successful. There are often students who are very interested in foreign countries but had never been to that country, but they have learned much about the local market and culture from the Internet. This would seem to be a delightful way for students to combine tech, with which they are intimately familiar, with foreign cultures.
I also really like this concept of using a larger group project that can be broken down into pieces. I find that I am often trying to pack numerous application lessons into a term so that each week has an appropriate series of examples, but perhaps the level of engagement and application would be higher for an ongoing project. In particular, micro-case studies have only a brief opportunity to collect evidence, analyze, and sharing results, and identifying and implementing changes often is provided very cursorily so that we can move on to the next lesson. However, this certainly is a benefit in exploring each of these factors in depth so that students obtain a real-world experience and greater immersion. I like the approach!
