Comments on: Plagiarism, Just Fine

By: The burden is on us « Random Thoughts

The burden is on us « Random Thoughts — Sat, 05 Jul 2008 16:32:15 +0000

[...] burden is on us Posted on June 11, 2007 by Nancy A History Teacher has an interesting post on plagiarism and how he has changed one of his assignments to avoid it. This is exactly the kind [...]

By: Dragon Management

Dragon Management — Wed, 29 Aug 2007 22:22:22 +0000

I just found a 10th grader’s paper yesterday that boldly used the phrase “talismanic individuals.” See Wikipedia, “periodization.”

When will they learn? [Sigh.]

By: jocelyn

jocelyn — Thu, 12 Jul 2007 16:36:49 +0000

I don’t have an alternative to the term paper, but I have a question. Why are students cheating in such rampant numbers? Have they always? Is it just that technology provides teachers with the tools to catch the guilty parties?

I suppose I would also ask, what is the purpose of a term paper? What skills should writing one teach? I’ve been out of college for over a decade (not that long relatively speaking), but I’ve found that younger people (with good educations!) that I have hired for entry level positions lack the skills, or determination?, to find the answer to a question or a problem. If they can’t find something in two or three google searches, they report back to me that ‘it doesn’t exist.’ Then, I spend ten minutes trying various other unrelated terms and investigating possibilities (THINKING!) and unearth the results I’d asked them to find. I may be rambling at this point, but perhaps there are ‘problem solving’ assignments that can be created where by students are asked to think through a question or theme, and those who illustrate the deepest thinking are rewarded with the highest marks. I’m not sure what that work product looks like, but the traditional term paper as I knew it probably isn’t the answer.

By: Wendell Dryden

Wendell Dryden — Wed, 11 Jul 2007 23:07:43 +0000

This may be a daft question, but couldn’t the learners just do their writing during classtime, with print resources on hand, etc? Even if they didn’t have as wide a field of resources, at least they would be producing original writing in an environment where they would have access to guidance as needed. That is, assuming the goal is to help them learn how to write, edit, cite, etc. If the goal is something else, then, yeah, dump the whole term-paper idea.

By: Woodenmask

Woodenmask — Tue, 03 Jul 2007 12:41:01 +0000

I don’t know the answer to the philisophical problem with TurnItIn making money from students’ work, but I do know that when I do require a traditional term paper, I LOVE having TurnItIn as a tool. When parents have questions, I can present them with a color-coded copy of their child’s report, annotated to show where the information came from. I show my students how the service works. There is always at least one student who points out that there is probably a way around TurnItIn’s filters. I point out that there probably is, but that it would probably take more work to figure it out than just writing the paper in the first place.

My school requires us to correct multiple drafts of any written work. I am very stressed for time, as it is, so I find that I don’t assign as many written projects. On the one hand, that’s great, because I end up with some great, highter-end thinking projects, but I worry about lowering the bar, literacy-wise. I want my 8th graders to communicate effectively and express their original thoughts well. They have some very good ideas which will only be given the respect they deserve if they are communicated elegantly and gramatically.

By: Western Dave

Western Dave — Thu, 21 Jun 2007 15:48:25 +0000

Smithie argued: “The assignment often has the added side effect of encouraging students to look at how standard texts have to leave information out to meet length requirements.” The very first lesson in 9th grade at my school is “History is the process of leaving things out.” All history is written with a point of view, whether it’s source selection, topic selection, or (as with textbooks) market considerations and usually some combination of all of the above.

By: Western Dave

Western Dave — Wed, 20 Jun 2007 15:19:39 +0000

My students have lots of access to things behind paywalls (e.g. JSTOR) that a google search won’t catch. Furthermore spending lots of time catching sophisticated cheaters is not a good use of my time. I am happy for my school to pay Turn-it-in so that I can spend more time giving decent feedback to my students who are not cheating. Since none of my students applied for copyrights or established that the work is copywrited prior to handing it in, the work does not enjoy copyright protections. I fail to see how this suit goes anywhere. Also, I have found the demonstrating how turn-it-in works before assigning papers makes it an effective deterrent. It also is really effective for catching kids who make up stuff. Their plagairism ratings are zero. Students can also use turn-it-in to check their own work before handing it in to make sure they aren’t accidentally plagairizing.

As for term papers that ask students to regurgitate. That’s a bad assignment. Students should be analyzing, synthesizing, arguing. If your question isn’t argumentative in nature. The point of writing about history is to pursuade; alternative assignments are nice sometimes but the minute you move away from the argumentative essay, you leave the heart of the historical enterprise.

By: Smithie

Smithie — Tue, 19 Jun 2007 21:39:26 +0000

I’m a fan of the “google technique”. It accomplishes the task pretty well and the kids are always aghast when caught at how easy it was to catch them.
As for alternates to the term paper I like to use a “textbook entry” with an illustration, brief annotated time line, key words, discussion questions and a VERY limited word count. I also give a relatively broad topic (race relations in the US between 1900 and 1945) so that the kids are forced to take out the fluff. The assignment often has the added side effect of encouraging students to look at how standard texts have to leave information out to meet length requirements. If all goes exceptionally well students begin to ask if there is more to a story than what they are reading in the book when we encounter new topics.

By: repairman

repairman — Tue, 19 Jun 2007 04:44:25 +0000

Maybe the great carousel of instructional methods has turned a few degrees and it’s time to go back to oral exams. I don’t know about you, but in graduate school (sociology), I worked harder on preparation for orals than any paper I ever did.

And just think…you can evaluate on the spot!

Just thinking out loud.

I taught eighth grade US history (retired in 2003) and relied on many different classroom assessment methods to accommodate student strengths.

By: Julia

Julia — Sun, 17 Jun 2007 02:49:29 +0000

I have used turnitin.com for the past two years with great success in high school social studies classes. My school has stressed that research papers are required in college with sometimes severe consequences for plagiarism so it is best now to learn how to write and know you can be caught for doing things you are not supposed to do. One criticism high school students sometimes make once they get to college is that they were not required enough to write research or other kinds of papers while in high school. So, along with the English department, I make them do some serious writing in social studies classes. Plagiarism has been a problem but not so much now using turnitin.com. I read about the lawsuit and don’t know the answer but I like having a vehicle helping me stem the tide.
However, I also do technology connected critical thinking projects like other people mentioned such as comic books, digital memory books, newspapers, brochures, and a variety of other things. I think I am searching for a mix of experiences, technology oriented as well as traditional; afterall, a thesis is required for a masters and a dissertation is mandatory for a doctorate. Formal writing has its place in education and I think we need to continue to teach and use it.