Thursday, October 12, 2017

Plagiarism Detection and Prevention



During this week’s lessons we have reviewed Plagiarism and the different types of detection and prevention methods instructors put into place. “Plagiarism occurs when a writer deliberately uses someone else’s language, ideas, or other original (not common-knowledge) materials without acknowledging its source” (Plagiarism by Adult Learners Online: A case study in detection and remediation, 2006).

There are many types of software available for plagiarism detection from web based applications such as turnitin.com to facility owned databases. With the facility owned or sponsored databases learners must submit their work through the school’s website. The work is then compared to other articles and papers the school has access to. With the web based application, work is submitted via the website, and compared online among others. Both of these applications compare papers and provides a percentage of how much the submitted paper matches another source available.

In the online videocast with Dr. Pallofff and Pratt, they discussed various measures a facilitator can apply to content to reduce or eliminate cheating and plagiarizing. Some of the items were to design assessments to mirror real-life expectations and to incorporate collaboration. By implementing these approaches, learners are less incline to cheat because it is not required to pass the assessment. Being able to work with others, and locate resources that provide the answers is what is being assessed.

Also, it was discussed in the videocast that many learners do not consider copying and pasting from websites as cheating, nor reusing work they did for a previous course. The instructor should ensure they are taking the time to educate learners about copyright, fair use, plagiarism, and cheating (Laureate Education (Producer), 2010).






5 comments:

  1. Great post, Danny!

    Your reflection regarding the copy/paste inclination resulting in users' inadvertent practice of plagiarism is prevalent. The copy/paste tool is so readily available in Enterprise software that not having it would deter a person from buying a software program that didn't include it.

    The use of knowledge made freely available on the Internet can benefit research, but even freely usable photos and text should be accompanied with a citation. The prevalence and accessibility of knowledge has "...moved us from the horse and buggy days of plagiarism to the Space Age without stopping for the horseless carriage" (Ziden, et al, 2009, p. 180).

    Providing students with guidelines that ensure academic integrity and its consequences has been offered as the best solution to academic dishonesty.

    References:

    Ziden, A. A., Fook, F. S., Idrus, R. M., & Ismail, I. (2009). "The types of online interaction model: Individual approaches in online discussions. Paper prested at the 5th WSEAS/IASME International Conference on Educational Technology, LaLagune, Spain.

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  2. The only thing that I found odd in this week's material was the fact that many students did not find copying and pasting from the internet to be cheating. As a 6th grade teacher (a math teacher) I know that we do plenty on making sure to give credit where credit is due. I wonder if most of these students are adult learners who, never had access to Google when they were coming up through school so the thought never crossed their mind? Other than that I find that everything else that was mentioned was extremely important to learn, especially on how to adjust assessments and almost avoiding exams entirely. Great post!

    -Craig

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  3. Great post! I also agree that we, as instructors, should educate our learners prior to beginning our curriculum on what counts as plagiarism and cheating. We would be surprised how many learners are not aware of what activities fall under these two topics. I also think that by having assessments that tailor to more real life situations can make cheating a little more difficult, but can be a timing issue for the professor. It takes a little more creativity and design to create assessments that fall under that window. Thanks again for your post!

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    1. This is Ginger Laforestrie by the way..

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