Using Blogs to Identify Misconceptions in a Large Undergraduate Nutrition Course By Trena Paulus and Marsha Spence

The first thing I noticed was the immediate establishment of purpose, not what the authors were looking for but why they chose, in this case "nutrition" and "blogs". At no point was their an inflection of desired or expected results. While I know I should have been concentrating on the methodology of the study and how and why decisions were made I couldn't help notice something, small group sizes. In much of the reading I've done, not just in this class, I found that successful attempts at facilitating critical thinking, communities of inquiry, or whatever term you want to use, involve small groups. I found that note worthy. I realize that it is pointed out in the study but I wonder what would have happened to the quality of responses if they were not for a grade. If the blogs were available for student use but not required, but I suppose thats another study entirely. Another thing that I thought was important from a research perspective was the process. In this particular case the study was an inaugural run so to speak. There were a number of things that went right and a number of things that were not expected or desired. The data and study were analyzed and the study was repeated with changes to improve the research method. Prime examples of this are giving GTAs more training, and moving blog due dates to prevent them from coinciding with tests. The study was performed, analyzed, improved, and then repeated. This is different from other articles I read were mistakes and problems that arose were simply noted and then taken into account in the finding with no attempt to correct.