Avoiding Plagiarism

Summary:
This peice of writing is a statement by the WPA that aims to set a foundation for the understanding and treatment of plagiarism. The article begins by stating that there seems to have been an increased problem with plagiarism with the advent of the Internet. The article is organized into four points which are listed at the beginning of the article.
The first thing that is done is to define plagiarism as a deliberate act of taking ideas or language and not giving credit where it is due. The authors make a definite distinction between academic dishonesty misuse of sources at this point which is a predominate theme for the rest of the article.
The next section of the article deals with causes for plagiarism and also for the misuse of sources. The causes for plagiarism include poor time management, lack of consequences, and fear of failure. The causes for misuse of sources include a lack of knowledge about note taking and source integration.
Students, teachers, and administrators are all charged with certain responsibilities which could eliminate much of the plagiarism and misuse of sources. The students should know how, the teachers should tell them how and make the consequences clear, and the administrators should set the disciplinary action and provide support for faculty.
The final section of the article gives pedagogical advice for teachers on how to teach the research process and implement effective assignments.

Response:
I agreed with the definition of plagiarism that was given, although I thought they might have explained the common knowledge idea a little more. The article was effective in that it used the definition to rationalize the rest of the points and the organization of the remainder of the article.
I really liked the section that was labeled "best practices". One of the most effective things that I think teachers can do is to explain the reasons why research is done. If there is a topic which interests students, I think they would be more likely to actually find the answers they are seeking. Also, seeing the process rather than just the finished product would be helpful to students. I think that papers (especially by beginning writers) should give a good deal of credit for the process, since this is supposed to be one of the most important things in a research paper. I also liked the idea of the themed class design to help students narrow in on a topic. However, I am not sure how this might be implemented in a high school classroom.
Another point that I had never really considered, but which they discussed in detail in the responsibilities and best practices, was the issue of creating challenging writing assignments to avoid plagiarism. This is something that I know will be useful to me in my own teaching career.