#1:Plagiarism: What It is and How to Recognize and Avoid It



#1:Plagiarism: What It is and How to Recognize and Avoid It

What is Plagiarism and Why is it Important? In college courses, we are continually engaged with other people's ideas: we read them in texts, hear them in lecture, discuss them in class, and incorporate them into our own writing. As a result, it is very important that we give credit where it is due. Plagiarism is using others' ideas and words without clearly acknowledging the source of that information.

How Can Students Avoid Plagiarism? To avoid plagiarism, you must give credit whenever you use:

• another person's idea, opinion, or theory;

• any facts, statistics, graphs, drawings--any pieces of information--that are not common knowledge;

• quotations of another person's actual spoken or written words; or

• paraphrase of another person's spoken or written words.

How to Recognize Unacceptable and Acceptable Paraphrases

Here's the ORIGINAL text, from page 1 of Lizzie Borden: A Case Book of Family and Crime in the 1890s by Joyce Williams et al.:

The rise of industry, the growth of cities, and the expansion of the population were the three great developments of late nineteenth century American history. As new, larger, steam-powered factories became a feature of the American landscape in the East, they transformed farm hands into industrial laborers, and provided jobs for a rising tide of immigrants. With industry came urbanization the growth of large cities (like Fall River, Massachusetts, where the Bordens lived) which became the centers of production as well as of commerce and trade.

Here's an UNACCEPTABLE paraphrase that is plagiarism:

The increase of industry, the growth of cities, and the explosion of the population were three large factors of nineteenth century America. As steam-driven companies became more visible in the eastern part of the country, they changed farm hands into factory workers and provided jobs for the large wave of immigrants. With industry came the growth of large cities like Fall River where the Bordens lived that turned into centers of commerce and trade as well as production.

What makes this passage plagiarism?

The preceding passage is considered plagiarism for two reasons:

1.) The writer has only changed around a few words and phrases, or changed the order of the original's sentences.

2.) The writer has failed to cite a source for any of the ideas or facts.

If you do either or both of these things, you are plagiarizing.

NOTE: This paragraph is also problematic because it changes the sense of several sentences (for example, "steam-driven companies" in sentence two misses the original's emphasis on factories).

Here's an ACCEPTABLE paraphrase:

Fall River, where the Borden family lived, was typical of northeastern industrial cities of the nineteenth century. Steam-powered production had shifted labor from agriculture to manufacturing, and as immigrants arrived in the US, they found work in these new factories. As a result, populations grew, and large urban areas arose. Fall River was one of these manufacturing and commercial centers (Williams 1).

Why is this passage acceptable?

This is acceptable paraphrasing because the writer:

• accurately relays the information in the original uses her own words.

• lets the reader know the source of the information.

Here's an example of quotation and paraphrase used together, which is also ACCEPTABLE:

Fall River, where the Borden family lived, was typical of northeastern industrial cities of the nineteenth century. As steam-powered production shifted labor from agriculture to manufacturing, the demand for workers "transformed farm hands into factory workers," and created jobs for immigrants. In turn, growing populations increased the size of urban areas. Fall River was one of these manufacturing hubs that were also "centers of commerce and trade" (Williams 1).

Why is this passage acceptable?

This is acceptable paraphrasing because the writer:

• records the information in the original passage accurately.

• gives credit for the ideas in this passage.

• indicated which part is taken directly from her source by putting the passage in quotation marks and citing the page number.

Note that if the writer had used these phrases or sentences in her own paper without putting quotation marks around them, she would be PLAGIARIZING. Using another person's phrases or sentences without putting quotation marks around them is considered plagiarism EVEN IF THE WRITER CITES IN HER OWN TEXT THE SOURCE OF THE PHRASES OR SENTENCES SHE HAS QUOTED.

Plagiarism and the World Wide Web

The World Wide Web has become a more popular source of information for student papers, and many questions have arisen about how to avoid plagiarizing these sources. In most cases, the same rules apply as to a printed source: when a writer must refer to ideas or quote from a WWW site, she must cite that source.

If a writer wants to use visual information from a WWW site, many of the same rules apply. Copying visual information or graphics from a WWW site (or from a printed source) is very similar to quoting information, and the source of the visual information or graphic must be cited. These rules also apply to other uses of textual or visual information from WWW sites; for example, if a student is constructing a web page as a class project, and copies graphics or visual information from other sites, she must also provide information about the source of this information. In this case, it might be a good idea to obtain permission from the WWW site's owner before using the graphics.

Strategies for Avoiding Plagiarism

1. Put in quotations everything that comes directly from the text especially when taking notes.

2. Paraphrase, but be sure you are not just rearranging or replacing a few words. Instead, read over what you want to paraphrase carefully; cover up the text with your hand, or close the text so you can't see any of it (and so aren't tempted to use the text as a "guide"). Write out the idea in your own words without peeking.

3. Check your paraphrase against the original text to be sure you have not accidentally used the same phrases or words, and that the information is accurate.

Terms You Need to Know (or What is Common Knowledge?)

a.) Common knowledge: facts that can be found in numerous places and are likely to be known by a lot of people.

Example: John F. Kennedy was elected President of the United States in 1960.

This is generally known information. You do not need to document this fact. However, you must document facts that

are not generally known and ideas that interpret facts.

Example: According the American Family Leave Coalition's new book, Family Issues and Congress,

President Bush's relationship with Congress has hindered family leave legislation (6).

The idea that "Bush's relationship with Congress has hindered family leave legislation" is not a fact but an interpretation;

consequently, you need to cite your source.

b.) Quotation: using someone's words. When you quote, place the passage you are using in quotation marks, and document the source

according to a standard documentation style. The following example uses the Modern Language Association's (MLA) style:

Example: According to Peter S. Pritchard in USA Today, "Public schools need reform

but they're irreplaceable in teaching all the nation's young" (14).

c.) Paraphrase: using someone's ideas, but putting them in your own words. This is probably the skill you will use most when

incorporating sources into your writing. Although you use your own words to paraphrase, you must still acknowledge the source of

the information.

Produced by Writing Tutorial Services, Indiana University, Bloomington, IN -Handout copied from:

#2: Avoiding Plagiarism



Since teachers and administrators may

not distinguish between deliberate and

accidental plagiarism, the heart of avoiding

plagiarism is to make sure you give

credit where it is due. This may be

credit for something somebody said,

wrote, emailed, drew, or implied.

Choosing When to Give Credit

|Need to Document |No Need to Document |

|When you are using or referring to somebody else’s words or ideas from a |When you are writing your own experiences, your own observations, your |

|magazine, book, newspaper, song, TV program, movie, Web page, computer |own insights, your own thoughts, your own conclusions about a subject |

|program, letter, advertisement, or any other medium |When you are using "common knowledge" — folklore, common sense |

|When you use information gained through interviewing another person |observations, shared information within your field of study or cultural|

|When you copy the exact words or a "unique phrase" from somewhere |group |

|When you reprint any diagrams, illustrations, charts, and pictures |When you are compiling generally accepted facts |

|When you use ideas that others have given you in conversations or over email|When you are writing up your own experimental results |

Deciding if something is "Common Knowledge"

Material is probably common knowledge if . . .

• You find the same information undocumented in at least five other sources

• It is information that your readers will already know

• a person could easily find the information with ONLY general reference sources

Making Sure You Are Safe

| |Action during the writing process |Appearance on the finished product |

|When researching, note-taking, and |Mark everything that is someone else’s words with|Proofread and check with your notes (or photocopies of |

|interviewing … |a big Q (for quote) or with big quotation marks |sources) to make sure that anything taken from your notes is|

| |Indicate in your notes which ideas are taken from|acknowledged in some combination of the ways listed below: |

| |sources (S) and which are your own insights (ME) |In-text citation |

| |Record all of the relevant documentation |Footnotes |

| |information in your notes |Bibliography |

| | |Quotation marks |

| | |Indirect quotations |

|When paraphrasing and summarizing … |First, write your paraphrase and summary without |Begin your summary with a statement giving credit to the |

| |looking at the original text, so you rely only on|source: According to Jonathan Kozol,... |

| |your memory. |Put any unique words or phrases that you cannot change, or |

| |Next, check your version with the original for |do not want to change, in quotation marks: ... "savage |

| |content, accuracy, and mistakenly borrowed |inequalities" exist throughout our educational system |

| |phrases |(Kozol). |

|When quoting |Keep the person’s name near the quote in your |Mention the person’s name either at the beginning of the |

|directly … |notes, and in your paper |quote, in the middle, or at the end |

| |Select those direct quotes that make the most |Put quotation marks around the text that you are quoting |

| |impact in your paper -- too many direct quotes |Indicate added phrases in brackets ([ ]) and omitted text |

| |may lessen your credibility and interfere with |with ellipses (. . .) |

| |your style | |

|When quoting indirectly … |Keep the person’s name near the text in your |Mention the person’s name either at the beginning of the |

| |notes, and in your paper |information, or in the middle, or at that end |

| |Rewrite the key ideas using different words and |Double check to make sure that your words and sentence |

| |sentence structures than the original text |structures are different than the original text |

Sources used in creating this handout: Aaron, Jane E. The Little, Brown Essential Handbook for Writers. New York: HarperCollins, 1994.; Gefvert, Constance J. The Confident Writer, second edition. New York: Norton, 1988; Heffernan, James A.W., and John E. Lincoln. Writing: A College Handbook, third edition. New York: Norton, 1990; Howell, James F. and Dean Memering. Brief Handbook for Writers, third edition. Englewood Cliffs, NJ: Prentice Hall, 1993; Leki, Ilona. Understanding ESL Writers: A Guide for Teachers. Portsmouth, NH: Boynton/Cook, 1992; Lester, James D. Writing Research Papers, sixth edition. New York: HarperCollins, 1990; Rodrigues, Dawn, and Myron C. Tuman. Writing Essentials. New York: Norton, 1996; Swales, John, and Christine B. Feak. Academic Writing for Graduate Students. Ann Arbor, MI: University of Michigan Press, 1994; Walker, Melissa. Writing Research Papers, third edition. New York: Norton, 1993.

#3: From the Trunk of the Old Elm Tree: A Web Quest on Plagiarism

Designed by Mrs. Ellis

Introduction:

You are sitting in homeroom waiting for the bell to ring when one of your friends leans over and asks you if you finished your report for social studies class.  She tells you she’s been so busy practicing for the basketball game on Friday that she forgot to do it.  She wants you to be a pal and let her copy it or at least paraphrase it.  You wonder what you should do.  You’d like to help her out, but you’ve always been taught that copying someone else’s work is wrong.  Or another time you are part of a group doing research and have divided up the assignment so that each member is responsible for doing part of the assignment.  You do your part but one of the group members has copied their research off the Internet instead of writing it themselves.  What should you do when you find yourself in this situation?  You don’t feel right about ignoring this injustice, but you’re concerned about your grade and don’t want to say anything.  Fortunately they’re some arguments that you can use to convince your friends that what they are doing is wrong.  By reading further you can learn some solutions to these sticky situations.

 

The Task: 

The students mentioned in the introduction are committing a crime known as plagiarism. Plagiarism is another name for stealing someone else’s words or ideas. Even though it seems unimportant, it is important.  It is like any other form of stealing. Someone is being cheated, and unfortunately the one who is cheated the most is the person who plagiarizes material.  Plagiarism has serious consequences attached to it such as a failing grade on a project or being expelled from school.  By examining and being able to identify different forms of plagiarism, we can learn how to avoid committing it and/or avoid being a victim of it.  These are difficult spaces in which we can find ourselves from time to time.  But there are solutions. Continue working through the Web Quest to formulate a working definition of the term plagiarism and learn to identify various forms of it.

The Process and Resources:  

#3-1.  Using an online dictionary write a definition of the term “Plagiarism.”

#3-2. Read a story on plagiarism found at The New York Times Learning Network web site

and answer the following questions(you do not

need to write the questions, only answers):

a.) How did Ms. Prestebak discover that the high school student had taken his paper off the Internet?

b.)  How has the temptation to cheat been increased by access to the Internet?

c.)  What happened at the University of Virginia with regards to this topic?

d.)  What did Donald McCabe’s survey reveal?

e.)  According to Cathy Aubrecht, what is a sign that a student has plagiarized?

f.)  What are some resources that schools can use to find out if students are plagiarizing materials?

 #3-3.   After reading through the Purdue University web site on plagiarism to discover several forms of plagiarism (Hint: this is the first

pages in this package – you have already read this) -- -- list

at least 3 forms of plagiarism.

Evaluation:

#3-4. Write a summary explaining what plagiarism is, including the key points which you would use to discourage a classmate or friend

from copying material and not citing resources. (length: 20 – 40 words)

Conclusion:  Plagiarism is a growing problem with the increased use of the Internet.  Combating it involves education about what it is and how it can be destructive to intellectual and artistic freedom.   Students need to develop a strong set of values that recognize the need to respect others' ideas and literary and academic expressions.  They also need to stand up for these codes of behavior.  If another student is violating the rules, this needs to be pointed out to them.  It takes great courage to do this.  Hopefully with this lesson you are better prepared to fulfill this task.  If not, I suggest that you do further reading on the subject at the following website:

.

 

# 4: Let’s Practice What You Have Been Reading

Consider the following situations and decide if an act of plagiarism has happened or not, --giving specific reasons for your decision; reasons should come from what you have learned in this packet.

4-1. Ellen asks her supervisor at work if she could use the text of the training manual in an English assignment

about proper sales etiquette. Ellen uses entire passages from the manual without citing her source.

4-2. A student makes an appointment with the family physician in order to get information about the common cold. The helpful doctor gives the student brochures about causation and treatment. However, the doctor symptoms the student that the material is copyrighted by the American Medical Association. The student uses quotations from the brochures and cites the source material.

4-3. Roger has written a paper on King George III for his English class. He then must write a paper for U.S. History. He reuses one page from his English-class paper.

4-4. Sara's mother has downloaded an article from the Internet on the market in Korea for computers. Sara uses the information from the article in a report for her economics class. She has lost the original article and does not remember the source. She does not cite the article in her notes.

4-5. Jared copies a painting of a tiger by a famous living artist from an art magazine. He then enters the artwork in a school

competition as his own and wins.

4-6. Jennifer is just finishing up her American Literature Research Paper. The paper is due tomorrow. She discovers that

she has lost her notes and bibliography card for one of the citations in her paper. She does not know the publisher or

place published of her information, but she is sure of the author’s name and title of the book. She spends about 30

minutes looking for the article, but cannot find it. She types up the citation on the Works Cites page and just fakes the

name of the city where it was published and the name of the publisher.

 4-7. Define “common knowledge.”

 

#5

New York City College of Education: Friday, April 28, 2006

A Way With Words: Exploring Unintentional Plagiarism

5-1. Read the following article: “Novelist Says She Read Copied Books Several Times” and answer these questions: ) (Continue your answers on pages already started, do not re-write questions) (

a. To what has author Kaavya Viswanathan admitted?

b. What reasons did Ms. Viswanathan give for copying novels by Megan McCafferty?

c. What suggestion did Suzanne Gluck, Ms. Viswanathan’s agent, have regarding her writing?

d. How are Ms. Viswanathan’s plots and Ms. McCafferty’s plots similar?

e. What experiences does Ms. Viswanathan credit for her book?

f. Which ideas did Asya Muchnick suggest?

g. How is Ms. Viswanathan working to rectify the situation?

h. How does Ms. Viswanathan feel about what happened? Why?

Novelist Says She Read Copied Books Several Times--by DINITIA SMITH

April 28, 2006

In an interview yesterday at the office of Little, Brown, her publisher, Kaavya Viswanathan, who has admitted copying portions of her chick-lit novel, "How Opal Mehta Got Kissed, Got Wild and Got a Life," offered new details about how the book was written. Ms. Viswanathan, 19 and a sophomore at Harvard, has previously said her copying from two young adult novels by Megan McCafferty, "Sloppy Firsts" and "Second Helpings" was "unintentional and unconscious." In the interview, she said she had begun reading Ms. McCafferty's books when she was in high school and had read both books three or four times. She said she had last read Ms. McCafferty's novels in the fall of her senior year; she did not begin working on the manuscript that eventually became "Opal" until months afterward.

Some of the plagiarism may have happened because she has a photographic memory, Ms. Viswanathan said. "I remember by reading," she said. "I never take notes." In a profile published in The New York Times earlier this month, Ms. Viswanathan's agent, Jennifer Rudolph Walsh, said the plot and writing of "Opal" had been "1,000 percent" Ms. Viswanathan's. But in the interview, Ms. Viswanathan acknowledged that she had help conceiving the book from Alloy Entertainment, a "book packager." Ms. Viswanathan's parents sent her to a private college counselor, Katherine Cohen of IvyWise, who is also the author of a book on writing college applications. Ms. Cohen showed some of Ms. Viswanathan's writing to Suzanne Gluck, her agent at the William Morris Agency. Ms. Viswanathan said that she had written a piece in the vein of "The Lovely Bones," the 2002 best seller by Alice Sebold, but that Ms. Gluck thought that it was too dark. "They thought it would be better if I did a lighter piece. They thought that was more likely to sell."

No one at Alloy suggested she read Ms. McCafferty or any other author's work, Ms. Viswanathan said. The summer after graduating from high school, she wrote four chapters and a synopsis of what became "Opal," and sent them in an e-mailed message to Alloy. After some minor editing, Alloy said it would get back to her.

In October of her freshman year at Harvard, she received a call from Ms. Walsh, also an agent at William Morris, who told her she was going to start shopping the manuscript around. "Two days later, she called to say Little, Brown wants to buy the book."

Ms. Viswanathan said at the time she could not quite believe all this was happening to her. "It was amazing," she said. "I thought everyone was just being nice to me." Once the book was sold to Little, Brown, Ms. Viswanathan said, Alloy was no longer involved. The manuscript was edited by Asya Muchnick at Little, Brown. Ms. Muchnick has declined to comment. Ms. Viswanathan discovered the charges in The Harvard Crimson, which first reported them, on Sunday. In a previous interview she said the book required "the normal amount of editing." "We went through a couple of drafts," she said. "There was a lot of back and forth."

The similarities in language between Ms. Viswanathan's books and Ms. McCafferty's is striking, with numerous passages in "Opal" echoing the earlier books. But Ms. Viswanathan insisted that despite seeming similarities in the plot — Ms. McCafferty's book is also about a girl who lives in New Jersey wants to get into an Ivy League school, has three close girl friends, falls for a scruffy musician and makes a triumphant graduation speech — the story was her own. "It's my plot, my characters," Ms. Viswanathan insisted.

"I've never read a novel with an Indian-American protagonist," she said. "The plot points are reflections of my own experience. I'm an Indian-American. I got good grades." In genre novels about teenage girls, Ms. Viswanathan said, "there are always girls with problems with friends, and with meeting the love interest."

Ms. Viswanathan said that in her original manuscript Opal had four close friends but that Ms. Muchnick suggested she cut one out. Opal's graduation speech was also her editor's idea, Ms. Viswanathan said. Ms. Viswanathan said she is working on rewriting the novel to take out the offending passages. Michael Pietsch, Little, Brown's publisher, said there were no plans to pull "Opal" from stores. And, though most contracts specify that a work submitted to a publisher must be entirely the author's own work, he said, the publishing house will not sue Ms. Viswanathan for breach of contract.

Meanwhile, Ms. Viswanathan said: "All I really want to do is apologize to Ms. McCafferty. I don't want her to think I intended to cause her distress, because I admire her so much." "I really thought the words were my own. I guess it's just been in my head," added Ms. Viswanathan, who also said that she plans to return to Harvard. "I feel as confused as anyone about it, because it happened so many times."

Published in the Arts section on April 27, 2006. **********************************************************************************

Refer to pages 1-6 for reference! Pages 1-6 will be useful when writing your Research Paper.

.

DUE DATE: _Friday, Sept 13th, turn in ANSWER SHEETS beginning of class Turn in ANSWER Pages ONLY

One day late = - 10% Two days late = - 20 % Three days late = - 30%

* No work accepted after 3 days late

* No work accepted if student’s absence on due date is an “unexcused” absence as defined by

the school

************************************************************************

Have some extra time? These are interesting sites about different types of plagiarism:

1.) This is Columbia University’s site about music plagiarism; organized by year; contains recordings so you can hear the

music and make up your own mind; contains legal statements made in court about each case. Includes Michael

Jackson & Britney Spears cases.

2.) “Opening arguments were heard in London's High Court on

Monday in the case of two authors who claim that Dan Brown appropriated "the central architecture" of his book, The

Da Vinci Code from their nonfiction book The Holy Blood and the Holy Grail. A film version of the book, starring

Tom Hanks and directed by Ron Howard, is due to open the Cannes Film Festival in May, and at one point, one of the

justices asked an attorney for authors Michael Baigent and Richard Leigh whether they were attempting to have the

release of the film halted. News reports of the trial did not record their response. Brown has acknowledged that the

Baigent and Leigh book, which argues that Jesus Christ married Mary Magdalene and had a child with her, influenced

his tale. (Indeed, a new "code" was discovered by reporters covering the case: one of the central characters in the book

is named Leigh Teabing, which combines Leigh's name with an anagram of Baigent's. Brown also refers to their book

in the text of The Da Vinci Code.)”

3.) Plagiarism cases at Stanford

University, California

Name:_____________________ Answer Document Period: _____

Self Check Exercises

Below are some situations in which writers need to decide whether or not they are running the risk of plagiarizing. In the Y/N column, indicate if you would need to document (Yes), or if it is not necessary to provide quotation marks or a citation (No). If you do need to give the source credit in some way, explain how you would handle it. If not, explain why. Must Sign EACH LINE below for credit !!

|Situation |Y/N |If yes, what do you do? If no, why? (1 pt each) |

|1. You are writing new insights about your own |  |  |

|experiences. | | |

|2. You are using an editorial from your school's |  |  |

|newspaper with which you disagree. | | |

|3. You use some information from a source without |  |  |

|ever quoting it directly. | | |

|4. You have no other way of expressing the exact |  |  |

|meaning of a text without using the original | | |

|source verbatim. | | |

|5. You mention that many people in your discipline|  |  |

|belong to a certain organization. | | |

|6. You want to begin your paper with a story that |  |  |

|one of your classmates told about her experiences | | |

|in Bosnia. | | |

|7. The quote you want to use is too long, so you |  |  |

|leave out a couple of phrases. | | |

|8. You really like the particular phrase somebody |  |  |

|else made up, so you use it. | | |

|Item: |Point |Sign your name in each space below to indicate you have |

| |value: |completed and understand listed item. |

|1. I have read & understand pages 1 –4 |5 | |

|2. I have completed Self Check, (This is the above box –of 8 questions) |5 | |

|3. I understand Plagiarism. If you do NOT understand, do not sign; ask for | 2 | |

|additional reading and exercises to complete to gain understanding. | | |

|4. I understand the difference between common knowledge & | 2 | |

|Plagiarism. If you do NOT understand, do not sign; ask for additional | | |

|reading & exercises to complete to gain understanding. | | |

|5. I understand the difference between paraphrasing and plagiarism. If | 2 | |

|you do NOT understand, do not sign; ask for additional reading & | | |

|exercises to complete to gain understanding. | | |

|6. Page 4, Question 3- 1: |

|1 pt |

|7. Page 4, Question 3-2: |

|a.) |

|1pt |

| |

|b.) |

|1pt |

| |

|c.) |

|1 pt |

| |

|d.) |

|1 pt |

| |

|e.) |

|1pt |

| |

|f.) |

|1pt |

|8. Page 4, Question 3-3: |

|1.) |

|1 pt |

|2.) |

|1 pt |

| |

|1 pt |

|9. Page 4, Question 3-4 |

|1 pt |

| |

| |

| |

| |

|Page 4, Question 4-1: |

|1 pt |

| |

|Page 4, Question 4-2: |

|1 pt |

| |

|Page 4, Question 4-3: |

|1 pt |

| |

|Page 4, Question 4-4: |

|1 pt |

|Page 5, Question 4-5: |

|1 pt |

| |

|Page 5, Question 4-6: |

|1 pt |

| |

|Page 5, Question 4-7: |

|1 pt |

|Page 5, Question 1a: 1pt |

|Page 5, Question 1b: |

|1 pt |

| |

|Page 5, Question 1c: |

|1 pt |

|Page 5, Question 1d: |

|1 pt |

|Page 5, Question 1e: |

|1 pt |

|Page 5, Question 1f: |

|1 pt |

| |

|Page 5, Question 1 g: |

|1 pts |

| |

|Page 5, Question 1 h: |

|1 pt |

| |

TOTAL POINTS POSSIBLE: 50 EARNED POINTS:_________ © jcoane

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