Plagiarism

OBJECTIVES:

To find out about plagiarism and the importance of citing sources.

RESOURCES:

Internet access | Plagiarism

Introduction Icon.png Introduction

Today we are learning about the importance of using your own words when writing a research report and not copying and pasting words directly from an internet page or a document.  If you simply copy or cut and paste information directly from the internet, a book or an encyclopaedia, this is called plagiarism (PLAY-juh-rih-zem).

Watch the Plagiarism video below, several times to understand plagiarism.  Your child may have done this before in their work, that's why it is important to learn what it is!

Plagiarism is a form of cheating but, unless we’ve been taught about plagiarism, it is easy to make the mistake of copying from another source without realising we have done anything wrong.

The word plagiarism comes from a Latin word for kidnapping. Discuss with your child that kidnapping is stealing a person and therefore plagiarism is stealing a person’s ideas or writing.  Remind your child that they wouldn’t take someone’s money or bike so someone’s words and thoughts are personal property, too.

Read Icon.png Read

Read through the following example together:

Jane finds some interesting information on the internet for her Science report on sharks.  She highlights a paragraph that explains that most sharks grow to be only 3 to 4 feet long and can’t hurt people.  Jane copies this information and pastes it into her report.  She quickly changes the font so that it matches the rest of the report and continues her research.

Notice.png Discuss

Now discuss:

• Has Jane made a mistake, here? If so, what was it?
• What should she have done differently?

Jane did make a huge mistake. She committed plagiarism. Plagiarism is when you use someone else’s words or ideas and pass them off as your own. This is not allowed in school, college, or beyond, so it’s a good idea to learn the correct way to use resources, such as websites, books, magazines and encyclopaedia.

So, what should Jane have done differently?

Discuss how Jane should have given the author and the website credit for the information. Why? This is because Jane didn’t know this information before she discovered it from the website. These are not her own thoughts or ideas.

Citations

[1] www.youtube.com [2] www.youtube.com