Fostering personal reflection on the connection between technology and work processes in teams in the framework of the Human Resource Management lecture

In work psychology the theme of interaction of humans, organisations and technology has a long research tradition (Grote, 1997). In teaching continuing experience shows, however, that this central theme is difficult for students because it is very complex. By taking the perspective of situative learning (Greeno, 1998) a personal connection to the theme will be set up by actual personal application of a technology in the Human Resource Management I course. By tackling a tutor-led group project, communicated by electronic media and with collaboration via the BSCW platform, students will compile their own experiences and reflect on them in light of work psychology theory (with a final report on the cooperative effort). The innovative factor for teaching lies in application and theory-driven personal reflection on the effects of new technologies. An evaluation of the worth of the cooperative effort will be made on the basis of social, administrative and content-related contributions (Gerber, 2004). An online questionnaire will also be deployed at the beginning of the course to collect student details (age, gender, previous experience etc.). A concluding online questionnaire will involve subjective assessment of distributed cooperation and the pedagogical quality of the course.