Plagiarism is defined as "'wrongful appropriation' or ‘close imitation'" ("Plagiarism", 2011). Plagiarism is something that many of us in the education world (wither attending school or working in it) is familiar with. It's been around for a long time and something many educators have fought with to try and prevent. It's been pretty cut and dry as to what it meant even though detecting it was more difficult. Now a days we have the online environment and technology that makes defining plagiarism and cheating a bit more complicated. However, it may be surprising to know that "Learners cheat about as often in an online environment as they do in a face-to-face environment" (Palloff & Pratt, n.d.). What can we do to help stop plagiarism?First, there are tools that help the facilitator better detect plagiarism. "Free online search engines such as Google allow instructors to track down copied phrases, while commercially available plagiarism detection software and online services (e.g., Essay Verification Engine (EVE) and Turnitin.com) compare individual student papers to Web documents and/or essay databases to find and report instances of matching text" (Jocoy & DiBiase, 2006). I have not used the software programs, but the concept of them are very neat to me because students will turn in their work and then the software program would detect if there was any plagiarism. Nice and easy!
The second thing is to "educate learners about copyright, fair use, plagiarism, and cheating" (Palloff & Pratt, n.d.). Search engines are hugely popular when having to resea
rch something - I know I am a consistent user. However, the facilitator needs to emphasize that although the Internet and its search engines are excellent tools to utilize to help with research, anything gained from them and used in our own writing must be cited. In this instance, we are using them as a supporting resource, emphasizing the word "supporting". Therefore, we need to provide our audience with the information on where the rest of that work can be found. We need to also bring awareness to the fact that copying and pasting information from the Internet is a form of plagiarism that many learners don't know (Palloff & Pratt, n.d.). Another aspect that learners aren't aware of is the different forms of cheating. For example, reusing a paper you wrote in a previous course is a form of cheating (Palloff & Pratt, n.d.). Helping bring awareness to plagiarism and cheating will allow the learners to see where their boundaries are and help them stay successful in their learning.Those two steps are also great ways to help prevent academic dishonesty. Another action an instructor can take is to rethink their ideas behind their assessments. When the word "test" is brought up to learners, a good 75% of them immediately get anxious and highly nervous and it seems like they have instantly forgotten everything they've learned. This then results to them not testing well and being more susceptible to cheating. However, if we (as the instructors) take a step back and do an open book exam or allow them to collaborate during assessments, this will decrease the feeling of needing to cheat and increase their success rate. The goal of these assessments is usually for the facilitator to gauge how well the learners are grasping the material. If the questions are strong enough with enough analytical thinking, broadening the scope of more than just being done individually can certainly increase their learning level, comfort level, and decrease cheating (Palloff & Pratt, n.d.). Many times we stress that allowing the learners to collaborate and teach each other the material, helps them retain it better. So, how is it different when taking assessments? We simply want to see how they are grasping the material and if we allow them to collaborate and observe how they do, we can tell from there how well they are able to explain and talk their way through the questions using their new knowledge and/or material. In essence, we are still reaching our objective with the assessment in seeing how well they are performing with their new knowledge.
So, with all of that great information, it got me thinking as to what tools I would use as a future online instructor. I would definitely use one of the detection software's mentioned to help me in detecting plagiarism.
Sometimes it's not always easy and this software would help ensure I stay academically honest as well as my students. I will also consider group assessments or open book if appropriate because it would reduce the want for cheating, help build the learning community as they work through the questions together, and help them retain the information better because they are actively participating in their learning. Another tool I would use and would encourage others to consider to help prevent plagiarism is something my 6th grade teacher taught us to help with citing our resources. Every eighth sentence in a paragraph would be a cited resource and then the rest would be original information from us. Then as we got better, we were able to expand so that our resources were wherever we felt it would be most beneficial allowing us to express more of our own ideas with a sprinkle of outside support. This helps learners learn how to incorporate their own thoughts and utilize resources without overdoing it. A simple activity that has stuck with me through all of these years - I still consistently check to see if I have enough supporting resources to emphasize my own thoughts.One of the most important things to express to learners is that there is nothing wrong with using outside resources to help support an argument, but these absolutely must be cited. Otherwise, we are falsely expressing to our audience our knowledge and in the end harming our learning success. I like to end with the phrase "if you didn't say it, cite it".
References
Jocoy, C. & DiBiase, D. (2006). Plagiarism by adult learners online: A case study in detection and remediation. International Review of Research in Open & Distance Learning, 7(1), 1-15.
Palloff, R., and Pratt, K. Plagiarism and Cheating. Laureate Education, Inc. Retrieved April 7, 2011, from http://sylvan.live.ecollege.com/ec/crs/default.learn?CourseID=4894963&Survey=1&47=6260654&ClientNodeID=984650&coursenav=1&bhcp=1
Plagiarism. (2011, April). Wikipedia. Retrieved April 7, 2011, from http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Plagiarism
