Plagiarism: What is it?

"Plagiarism is using another person's words or ideas without giving credit to the other person. When you use someone else's words, you must put quotation marks around them and give the writer or speaker credit by revealing the source in a citation. Even if you revise or paraphrase the words of someone else or just use their ideas, you still must give the author credit in a note. Not giving due credit to the creator of an idea or writing is very much like lying."

http://www.virtualsalt.com/antiplag.htm

Plagiarism: Is it really a problem?

In a 2000-2001 study of 4,500 secondary school students, Donald McCabe found:

15% have submitted material obtained, in large part, from a web site or internet paper mill

52% have copied several sentences from a web site without citing the source

90% of students who plagiarize from the Internet have also plagiarized from written sources

Center for Academic Integrity

How do we know it isn’t yours?The paper, project or presentation:

• is just too good for the student’s level of understanding,

knowledge and/or skill;

• is consistently better when work is done at home rather than

in class;

• contains poorly written paragraphs at the beginning and end,

and high quality work in between;

• sounds familiar;

• is suspicious in terms of appearance or topic

Did You Know? The word plagiarism comes from the Latin plagiarius meaning “Kidnapper”

http://tutorials.sjlibrary.org/plagiarism/tutorial/introduction.php

In a 2000/2001 American high school study,“ 74% of the respondents admitted to one or

more instances of serious test cheating and 72% admitted to serious cheating on written assignments.

Over half of the students admitted they have engaged in some level of plagiarism on written assignments using the Internet.”

Center for Academic Integrity

Plagiarism

Did you know that copying someone else’s homework Is plagiarism?

Did you know that using someone else’s idea is plagiarism?

Did you know that copying and pasting information from the internet Is plagiarism?

What will happen at La Salle if I Plagiarize?

• At La Salle when you are given a test, assignment, homework or a project, the expectation is that only your work will be submitted for marking

When you have cheated or plagiarized on a test or assignment the work will not be marked. You will be unable to show that you have achieved some of the expectations of the course.

• The academic dishonesty penalty is the same as if you missed an assignment except that you will receive a disciplinary consequence selected from among the following:– Referral to administration– Documentation of the occurrence– Informing the parents/guardians– Counseling– Doing compensatory work– Academic assistance– Suspension– Removal from course

Academic Honesty and Post Secondary School

To combat Academic Dishonesty most Post Secondary Institutions:

-will not allow you use internet sources. You will be required to use only online databases.

-will require you to feed your work through an online plagiarism detector. If you have more that five consecutive words that match anything on the internet your work will not be accepted. You need to keep careful records and notes of all your research and sources so this is not a problem.

Turnitin or iThenticate.

Why do student do it?

• stress of a heavy workload and the competition for high

marks

• poor time management and planning skills

• lack of understanding about concepts and ethics of

intellectual property

• lack of confidence in their own research and writing skills

• project has no meaning for them - they are just “getting it

done”

How do I avoid plagiarizing?

– Follow the research guidelines set out by your teacher.

– Keep careful notes in your own hand writing that you can show your teacher.

– Keep an comprehensive bibliography – Use quotation marks for other people’s words– Use “in text” citations.– Summarize– Even if you use another person’s idea you have

to record it in the bibliography and include an in text citation.

Ask us for help. That is what we are here for.

Knowing how to do research will help you feel less overwhelmed and help you avoid cheating by stealing other people’s work and calling it your own.

When you pass someone else’s work off as your own the only person you are hurting is yourself. Education is about learning things. If you don’t think for yourself then you aren’t learning.

Research: Where do you begin?

What is your topic?

Let’s say your topic is Caffeine.

What aspect of Caffeine will your focus on?

For example: You may choose to focus on the health benefits of drinking coffee.

Key words

• What are some key words that relate to the topic Caffeine?

• Coffee, tea • Cocoa, cola,

chocolate• Stimulant

What are the key words for?

• These related key words can be used to:

• narrow your focus and organize your thoughts.

• enter into the library database.

• use in an internet search engine or database

• these key words may also be the topics of the paragraphs in your report.

Remember to record web sites in your bibliography

Do not trust information from web sites that do not have an author’s name attached to the information that you are reading!!!!!

• Check with Mel, Jerry or your teacher if you are not sure of the quality of a web site.

• Also check with Mel, Jerry or your teacher if you aren’t sure where to find the information from a website for your bibliography.

ALWAYS REMEMBER:• Record the bibliographical information that

is required for your bibliography.

BOOK WITH NO AUTHOR:• World Book Millennium, Chicago, Illinois :

World Book Inc.,2000.

A fast and easy way to create a bibliography is by using the website:

http://citationmachine.net

•Find out what style of bibliography your teacher prefers.•Start a bibliography as you begin your research.•Save it on your network space.•Add to it each time you use a resource.

It is difficult to create a bibliography “after the fact”

BEWARE: THE INTERNET LIES

• On most sites there is no way of knowing if the information that you are reading is accurate or reliable.

• Beware of web sites that do not have an author attached to the information you are reading.

• The ending of a web site address is a good indication of how reliable the information on that site will be.

• .edu stands for education. These sites are usually sponsored by

an educational facility

like a university.

.org stands for organization and could represent a highly persuasive group that is trying to sway your opinion about something and the information will most likely be biased.

However, reputable organizations like The Red Cross and Amnesty International also have web site addresses ending in .org

.com means commercial and chances are web sites with a URL address that end in .com are trying to sell you something.

Newspaper websites like

the Toronto Star have an URL address

that ends in .com www.torontostar.com

.gov means it is sponsored by the government.Can we trust the government?

Where do I go from here?

• You may be given a Research log that will help you organize your research.

• Always start with a definition of your topic.

• Check Grolier On-line encyclopedia to find out more about your topic.

• You can find out some more key words from the definition.

• It will help focus your research into sub topics.

Where do I find books?

• Does the La Salle library have any books on my topic. Go to the library database called Spectrum Patrons Catalogue and type in either Author / Title / Subject / Keyword to locate your book…

• Try the Kingston Public Library:

www.kfpl.ca

Vertical files

Jerry and Melanie read the Toronto Star, The Globe and Mail, The Kingston Whig Standard, The New York Times, MacLean’s Magazine and many more periodicals every day. We cut out articles on hundreds of topics. These articles can be found in the vertical files. Check it out. There may be a file on your project topic.

Knowledge Ontario Databases

You can find links to these through the library website!

Do you know what a Database is?

How is it different than the Internet?

Did you catch me?

I am guilty of plagiarism in this very presentation.

What did I do wrong?

I cut and pasted pictures and quotes without citing them so here is a list of recourses and web sites that I have used.

You even need to include pictures in your bibliography and/or list of resources.

Original words and images that you generate yourself do not need to go into your bibliography.

We took this picture ourselves.So it is original and does not need to be listed in a bibliography

I got the picture from http://people.brandeis.edu

Resources

Material for this presentation was adapted from the following sources:

• Ann Lathrop and Kathleen Foss. Student Cheating and Plagiarism in the Internet Era.

• Lisa Renard. “ Cut and Paste 101: Plagiarism and the Net”, Educational Leadership, Dec. 1999/Jan. 2000.

• Suzanne Preate. Internet Plagiarism. Syracuse University Library

• The Ontario Library Associations Curriculum Support 2003

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