TECHNOLOGY AND THE ADMINISTRATOR

Technological Influences on Plagiarism

By Renee Becket, a www.eHow.com Contributor

Ben Randall

Grit 687

Tech & the Admin.

June 6th, 2012

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SUMMARYThere is a battle going on between websites that offer services to catch plagiarism and websites that will write a paper for a fee. In this article, Technological Influences on Plagiarism, by Renee Becket, the internet is looked at as a negative tool to cheat at school work. The information age has given students unlimited amounts of resources to use as they please. Students can search a topic, copy and paste information, put their name on the paper, and call it their own. Unfortunately, far too many students are doing this and many of them have no idea that it is wrong as well as illegal. Far too often, other people’s work is taken and put onto a paper as someone else’s but there is a way to detect plagiarism.

Who knows how to detect plagiarism here?

A teacher can copy a line of text that he or she believes may be copied and place it on a plagiarism detection website. Since Google has gotten so heavily used, a teacher can do the same on Google search. Far too often, credit is not given to the original writers and photographers of a piece of work, which can easily put students in a sticky legal situation. All of this plagiarism could have been avoided had their teachers been more proactive in teaching their students how to cite other people’s work.

WHO IS AFFECTED THE MOST?

Technologies like the Internet have a negative influence on students who might be tempted by plagiarism. A student pressured to keep a high GPA will go online to find a quick fix for his writing woes. Many websites offer assignment writing services; others make it easy to download papers. Yet new plagiarizing checker software can also have a positive impact in helping both teachers and students make plagiarism a less viable option.

-Becket-

SOME HELPFUL INFORMATION FOR TEACHERS

Plagiarism and Its Definition 

To plagiarize is simply defined as " to steal and pass off (the ideas or words of another) as one's own.” Merriam-Webster.com. It is a major issue in academic circles as students will admit to doing it, yet without fully understanding the problem. The first step to preventing plagiarized work is to have clear guidelines for students to follow during the writing process. For example, students can avoid unintentional duplication by using proper research and citation methods.

WHAT TO LOOK OUT FORPlagiarism Detectors

Once clear guidelines are created by teachers and understood by students, the next step is to implement a system to check for plagiarism. One way is to use a plagiarism checker online software. Students must be made aware that their submitted papers will be going through a screening, and ideally the student will be made a part of this process.

The problem with online access to ready-made content is that it becomes easy to download papers when an assignment deadline is approaching. Websites that offer free download papers make the temptation of an easy grade more difficult to resist. Another form of plagiarism is patchwriting, a simple process of copying text then making grammatical alterations. Other substitutions are done quickly with the MS-Word synonym-finder and without the need to acquire or use any writing skills.

Internet Temptation 

The problem with online access to ready-made content is that it becomes easy to download papers when an assignment deadline is approaching. Websites that offer free download papers make the temptation of an easy grade more difficult to resist. Another form of plagiarism is patchwriting, a simple process of copying text then making grammatical alterations. Other substitutions are done quickly with the MS-Word synonym-finder and without the need to acquire or use any writing skills.

Anti-Plagiarism

A plagiarism detector software is only one way to implement a policy geared against cheating and misrepresented student work. Russell Hunt of St. Thomas University admits that "the institutional structures around grades and certification are challenged" by Internet plagiarism. More importantly, he states that anti-plagiarism institutional programs may be detrimental to student learning. They destroy the student's ability to learn "how the intellectual enterprise of scholarship and research really works," while being able to think independently.

MY REFLECTIONAs the technology teacher at John B. Stetson Middle School, I have my 5th through 8th grade students do research based projects often in class. One of my latest projects for my 5th graders was a Power Point project. The students were instructed to do research on a positive influence and create a biography on that influential person. The students needed to add pictures and quotes to their projects. The layout of the Power Point projects were as follows, a title slide, who, what, when, where, and why slides, and a resources used page to give credit to the owners of the quotes and pictures. Many of my students had no idea that they needed to give credit for pictures and quotes. Furthermore, they were able to get all the way up through the 5th grade without citing their work. This made me question the teachers’ ethical choice to allow their students to skip such a critical, legal part of writing exercises. For my project, I allowed my students to use www.easybib.com On this site, students can put together their resources Used section of their papers easily and with online support from the site. Another great place for information regarding citing resources is this web site. http://www.imarksweb.net/book/middle+school+worksheet+citation/ . This site goes over MLA, APA, citing from newspapers, online journals, books and much more. It also has different sections dedicated to elementary, middle, and high school students. Imarksweb is a great resource for teachers who want to teach their students citing. This site also has worksheets that teachers can use to educate students on how to cite pieces of work. There are other sites available that an individual can simply fill in the lines for different data such as date, author, editor, and so on, and the computer will generate an accurate copy of a resources used page for a paper.

RESOURCES USED

Plagiarism definition.http://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/plagiarism

Technological Influences on Plagiarism, Becket, Renee http://www.ehow.com/info_7837237_technological-influences-plagiarism.html