Shared timeline and individual experience: Supporting retrospective reflection in student software engineering teams

To help SE student teams learn from their project process, we propose the use of facilitated postmortem workshops in which each team reconstructs its project timeline. Individual team members' experience of the project is included by team members drawing individual 'experience curves' along the timeline. The approach is based on current industry practice and adapted in accordance with theory on reflection and learning. We present the detailed design of the workshops as they were implemented in an undergraduate SE project course as well as some recommendations for future workshops. The workshops are effective for promoting active participation, constructing a shared representation of the project process, and revisiting project issues from multiple perspectives. Evaluation showed that students were satisfied with the workshop and motivated to use the approach in later projects.