Teaching & Learning
Introduction
HRD and Teaching & Learning: Research and Practice
The HRD Special Interest Group
Introduction
An interest in teaching and learning is of fundamental importance to the Forum in two respects. First, conceptually, human resource development and learning are in many respects indistinguishable. At its heart HRD is about lifelong learning. Secondly, a priority interest of the Forum, and many of its members, is how best to teach the subject of Human Resource Development, in whatever qualification or continuous professional development context such a subject is a component part.
HRD and Teaching & Learning: Research and Practice
An exploratory project (Sambrook and Stewart, 2007) undertaken in 2007 looked at the relationship between HRD and teaching and learning.
The following were the main findings:
- HRD is a complex subject and the curriculum is not easy to define
- HRD is clearly concerned with professional practice and teaching the subject in HE is about influencing and shaping practice.
- Research in HRD is healthy although there is little research about TLA in the subject.
- Business and management academics in other disciplines are taken out of their professional context when they research and study TLA of their subject. For HRD academics, researching TLA is researching their professional practice and it may be that to do so within the context of HRD educational programmes is both less interesting and seen as somehow incestuous.
- There is a need to encourage research in TLA of HRD.
- There is a lack of mechanisms for the sharing of good practice in TLA of HRD.
The full report can be downloaded here (link) …A key feature of this part of the UFHRD web site is devoted to addressing the findings above. During 2009 a bank of ‘good practice’ resources will be generated and stored on the web site. These will be accessible through the “HRD Teaching and Learning Resource Archive” – see opposite.The Research Honorarium in 2008 had a strong HRD teaching and learning thread and six teaching and learning projects are currently underway. See….
The HRD Special Interest Group
The HE Academy in the UK was established in, with a mission is to support the higher education sector in providing the best possible learning experience for all students. The HE Academy provides subject-specific support for enhancing the student learning experience through a nation-wide network of 24 Subject Centres. Within the Business Management Accounting and Finance (BMAF) (link address: http://www.heacademy.ac.uk/business/ ) subject group are a number of Special Interest Groups; one such being the HRD Special Interest Group (link address: http://www.heacademy.ac.uk/business/ourwork/sigs/Human_Resource_Development) Thus, the HRD SIG is a jointly funded initiative between the Forum and BMAF. Its aim is to focus on improving Teaching, Learning and Assessment (TL&A) in HRD courses through research and dissemination.
The SIG Leader is Claire Valentin, University of Edinburgh; claire.valentin@ed.ac.uk