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Cerebral · 10-15-2007, 02:35 AM

Is it sick and twisted that I find pleasure in discovering plagiarized homework assignments that have been handed in to me by students? There's a certain thrill to the chase that only Inspector Gadget would understand.

Option84 · 10-15-2007, 03:17 AM

I hope you aren't an English teacher because your grammar is horrible.

Cerebral · 10-15-2007, 04:56 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Option84

I hope you aren't an English teacher because your grammar is horrible.

I'm not.

However, I'd be curious to hear your explanation as to how my previous post is riddled with grammatical errors.

Iowa_Flames_Fan · 10-15-2007, 06:10 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Cerebral

I'm not.

However, I'd be curious to hear your explanation as to how my previous post is riddled with grammatical errors.

Me too. And I AM an English teacher.

Displaced Flames fan · 10-15-2007, 06:21 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Option84

I hope you aren't an English teacher because your grammar is horrible.

Phaneuf3 · 10-15-2007, 07:21 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Option84

I hope you aren't an English teacher because your grammar is horrible.

lol?

Iowa_Flames_Fan · 10-15-2007, 07:40 AM

On topic:

I feel the opposite way--I hate when my students plagiarize their work, because it makes so much extra work for me and my superiors, not to mention the inevitable confrontation where you can see in their face that they are weighing their options (plausible deniability or tears) and trying to figure a way out of the pickle that they're in.

I'd rather they just did their own work in the first place.

Regorium · 10-15-2007, 07:40 AM

I've always wondered whether or not teachers actually cared about plagiarism. I've had friends blatantly copy from wikipedia, or even in one case, print off the wikipedia article directly from IE so the web address was on the bottom of the page with no repercussions at all.

I would've gotten sick pleasure in watching my friends fail because I busted my ass to finish the same assignments (and got the same "you passed" mark).

So to answer your question, no, I don't think it's sick and twisted =D

Iowa_Flames_Fan · 10-15-2007, 07:48 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Regorium

I've always wondered whether or not teachers actually cared about plagiarism. I've had friends blatantly copy from wikipedia, or even in one case, print off the wikipedia article directly from IE so the web address was on the bottom of the page with no repercussions at all.

I would've gotten sick pleasure in watching my friends fail because I busted my ass to finish the same assignments (and got the same "you passed" mark).

So to answer your question, no, I don't think it's sick and twisted =D

That's ballsy. I've had students plagiarize from Wikipedia, and my first thought is "do they really think I'm that much of an idiot? Like they're the only ones with access to the internet?"

I guess the answer is "Yes." Needless to say, the wikipedia types are the easiest to bust.

getbak · 10-15-2007, 08:23 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Iowa_Flames_Fan

Me too. And I AM an English teacher.

Quote:

Originally Posted by Iowa_Flames_Fan

not to mention the inevitable confrontation where you can see in their face that their weighing their options

kermitology · 10-15-2007, 08:43 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Iowa_Flames_Fan

That's ballsy. I've had students plagiarize from Wikipedia, and my first thought is "do they really think I'm that much of an idiot? Like they're the only ones with access to the internet?"

I guess the answer is "Yes." Needless to say, the wikipedia types are the easiest to bust.

When I was living at home, my mom would occasionally show me a piece from one of her students and ask me.. Does this look odd to you? Then she'd show me something else they'd written. Like hell this English 20-2 student knows how to use a colon properly! So I go on google and type in the first sentence of a paragraph and what do I find? The whole paper!

It's shocking sometimes. My mom wonders the same thing.. Do these kids think I don't know what google is? Or that I don't have the internet?

Iowa_Flames_Fan · 10-15-2007, 08:47 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by getbak

ha.... oops!

In my defence, I did have a four-month old in my lap as I typed that!

underGRADFlame · 10-15-2007, 08:48 AM

Poor kids now it so easy to get caught. I was the first kid in my town to get internet and i ended up teaching a lot of teachers how to use it back in the early-mid 90's. It was so easy to plagiarize then, because no one knew where to grab the material from. Although I don't think I ever used a complete paper I definitely cheated in HS by use other internet papers as a base for my stuff.

Iowa_Flames_Fan · 10-15-2007, 08:53 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by underGRADFlame

Poor kids now it so easy to get caught. I was the first kid in my town to get internet and i ended up teaching a lot of teachers how to use it back in the early-mid 90's. It was so easy to plagiarize then, because no one knew where to grab the material from. Although I don't think I ever used a complete paper I definitely cheated in HS by use other internet papers as a base for my stuff.

The flip side of that is that it creates a lot of work for teachers. There's a service called turnitin.com that I've used in the past--I'm not too sure of its actual efficacy, but it seems to work ok as a deterrent. I just don't have the time (or the inclination) to be googling every paper.

The Goon · 10-15-2007, 08:57 AM

As I finished university in '94, it never actually occurred to me how easy it would be to plagarize information from the internet. It must be incredibly widespread.

You kids today (shakes fist)! I had to use PaperClip as a word processor on my crappy 9-pin dot matrix printer which jammed every second page!

underGRADFlame · 10-15-2007, 09:01 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Iowa_Flames_Fan

The flip side of that is that it creates a lot of work for teachers. There's a service called turnitin.com that I've used in the past--I'm not too sure of its actual efficacy, but it seems to work ok as a deterrent. I just don't have the time (or the inclination) to be googling every paper.

Hey by no means do I think it's right. I was a typical kid looking for a easy way out of writing a paper, I just thought I would add something to the thread. I know my senior year in HS I was helping the teachers source stuff like that so it didn't happen, I just joked with my teachers not to go back and check my work from 2 or 3 years previous.

Iowa_Flames_Fan · 10-15-2007, 09:53 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by underGRADFlame

Hey by no means do I think it's right. I was a typical kid looking for a easy way out of writing a paper, I just thought I would add something to the thread. I know my senior year in HS I was helping the teachers source stuff like that so it didn't happen, I just joked with my teachers not to go back and check my work from 2 or 3 years previous.

Yeah--I hear what you're saying. It's not a super-sore subject for me, because I've only caught a total of about 7 people over the years. I know people who've had far bigger problems with it--and one difference is assignment design--it's a little bit harder to plagiarize my assignments. I'm realistic, though: I know I've probably had lots of students get away with it, in part because I'm too lazy to do all that checking.

Research has shown that about 1 third of undergraduate work improperly uses sources, and that some portion of that is out-and-out plagiarized. That's an alarming statistic to me--as if there is a pattern of people not knowing that it's wrong.

To me, catching people who do it is not enough--you have to teach people to decide for themselves that plagiarism is wrong by appealing to their moral sense. Fear of repercussions will never be enough by itself.

Dr GonZo · 10-15-2007, 09:54 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Iowa_Flames_Fan

ha.... oops!

In my defence, I did have a four-month old in my lap as I typed that!

That makes it even worse: you're setting a bad example!

Iowa_Flames_Fan · 10-15-2007, 09:54 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Dr GonZo

That makes it even worse: you're setting a bad example!

Oh, she can't read yet.

She does think books are tasty, though!

Cerebral · 10-15-2007, 10:29 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Iowa_Flames_Fan

That's ballsy. I've had students plagiarize from Wikipedia, and my first thought is "do they really think I'm that much of an idiot? Like they're the only ones with access to the internet?"

I guess the answer is "Yes." Needless to say, the wikipedia types are the easiest to bust.

Yeah, one of my students took the information directly from Wikipedia. It leaves me scratching my head - does he honestly think I'm a complete and utter idiot?

On the flip side, I feel bad for him though as I understand the pressures associated with doing well in school. I have an unfortunate tendency to be a little more lenient when the cause of plagiarism is stress-related rather than shear laziness. I'm still a hard-ass when it comes to plagiarism though as it is simply unacceptable and a lot of students seem to have developed the mind-set that it's okay if you don't get caught.

I always give the student 0 in the case of plagiarism AND make them do the assignment again despite the fact that they won't get a mark for it.