MI Decoding by

Reputable Sources

2025-08-04 17:16:21 UTC

Students don’t know if the information they are reading is correct or not. They believe everything published is 100% correct and don’t acknowledge that even experts make mistakes. *lack critical thinking and healthy skepticism

Poor citation practices

2025-08-04 17:16:53 UTC

Students find and use articles, but the way they cite sources (information they provide, how they are integrated in their text, etc.) is less than ideal. Also an over reliance on direct quotes.

Reasons: lack of practice with this skill lack of understanding of why citation is important or is used.

Just regurgitating what they have read and not providing their own perspectives. They likely do this because they don't see themselves as having anything to add to the experts' conversation.

2025-08-04 17:16:58 UTC

Andrew's Response

2025-08-04 17:17:09 UTC

Often I wish students' source use was more complex. Instead of merely reporting back (summarizing) or agreeing/disagreeing (taking a simple position), I wish they would more often integrate that information into a "conversation."

To be blunt, they struggle with this because they haven't been asked to do this much before; and because it's not effectively modelled outside of academic writing.

not actually reading my comments and making good revisions

2025-08-04 17:17:22 UTC

Think linear

2025-08-04 17:17:32 UTC

Students expect that doing an investigation will be a linear process.

Types of evidence

2025-08-04 17:17:38 UTC

Not distinguishing between argument/opinion and external evidence when building their argument - presenting arguments with no evidence, not incorporating evidence in a greater narrative structure

Possible causes:

2025-08-04 17:17:39 UTC

expert-novice gap

Miscommunication between the instructor and student

Lack of student understanding of what research is

Student may look at research from a personal experience perspective (my experience=evidence)

2025-08-04 17:17:47 UTC

Students look for sources that support their opinions rather than researching/ exploring a variety of viewpoints.

Motivation

2025-08-04 17:17:53 UTC

Students often have so much going on that we don’t see (jobs, families, etc.). While I hope that all students will be able to find some motivation (be it that they are genuinely interested in the topic or that they are motivated by their grade), I have noticed that some students just can’t get there. Maybe it is burn-out? Maybe they are tired? Maybe they have other classes that are taking priority?

The students with the strongest motivation, however, do often turn in assignments that show the most effort.

Depth of argument

2025-08-04 17:17:57 UTC

Exploration of ideas are cursory; students often rely on a single source for multiple concepts of the arguement

Citation-information mismatch

2025-08-04 17:18:30 UTC

Often students will put a citation into their paper without a connection to the content of what they just wrote

2025-08-04 17:18:39 UTC

Using inappropriate sources.

2025-08-04 17:19:02 UTC

Great work is able to synthesize the material and use great primary sources. Less great work uses secondary sources or notes from class and regurgitates the information.

Mechanics

2025-08-04 17:19:03 UTC

Many students are not familiar with citation database tools (refworks, etc) that helps them organize information and to format citations

Invisible Expectations

2025-08-04 17:19:20 UTC

Persuasive

Valid (beyond my grade)

Evidence-based (not only authority-based)

campbell2127 — 2025-08-04 17:19:27 UTC

Students trivialize the importance of the assignment; want to submit anytihng they think will get credit; and want credit for "effort"

2025-08-04 17:19:47 UTC

They often believe there is a "right answer" to the research instead of treating it as an exploration on the topic, potentially with different perspectives.

It seems like this is what was expected of them in high school, and the switch to college creates a challenge for them.

Not investigating a variety of sources

2025-08-04 17:20:00 UTC

Students tend to accept the first source they find as definitive, without seeking out a variety of viewpoints.

History starts before 2021

2025-08-04 17:20:01 UTC

High reliance on current sources (e.g. last 5 years) so often miss seminal sources

Engaging with the drafting process

2025-08-04 17:20:05 UTC

Students often want their first draft to be their last, despite my course explicitly utilizing multiple drafts.

Causes

2025-08-04 17:21:05 UTC

Taught poor practices in high school

lack of scaffolding

2025-08-04 17:22:04 UTC

They're uncertain of the common steps that a research project takes to complete it.

Students don't often have scaffolded research experiences prior. So they don't know all the ins and outs of getting started with a research project.

Lack of analysis

2025-08-04 18:04:30 UTC

This is something that comes from my own learning from failure as a grad student. My professor asked me to redo an assignment because I merely summarized the article's perspective on the topic but didn't analyze it or talk about how it relates to the literature. While this is a relatively small piece of research, reading one article, they way we read sources is cumulatively very impactful on the final product of our own findings and how we share them