Turnitin is a plagiarism-prevention service and feedback tool which can be extremely useful in formative assessment to help students learn how to avoid plagiarism and improve their writing. This hands-on session will explore its features and the integration with the Assignment tool in Sulis from a pedagogically and research-informed perspective.
4. Plagiarism is:
‘copying someone else’s work (whether or
not in the public domain) and passing it off
as one’s own, or inappropriately
resubmitting one’s own already graded
work and passing it off as original.’
Teaching and Learning Committee guidelines for
Academic staff on dealing with plagiarism
http://www3.ul.ie/ctl/sites/default/files/Plagiarism%20guid
elines%20for%20academic%20staff.pdf
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5. Possible Scenario
A lecturer (or student who has access to it)
receives an originality report showing a match for
the following passage:
Today, according to authors of The Death of “e” and the Birth of the
Real New Economy doing business electronically is the only way to stay
alive and competitive. It is a necessity to get involved in the digital
economy. Therefore, “e” is disappearing from our vocabulary because
conducting business electronically is a normal, every-day activity.
Though a Google search, you find that the text is
found verbatim in an on-line article, entitled The
Death of “e” and the Birth of the Real New
Economy.
Is this plagiarism or a false positive? Why?
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6. Why do students plagiarise?
… The real problem is that it is paradoxical. After all, we
learn by copying. (…) It can feel as if you are being told to
‘sound like us, write like us, learn to think like us, but
whatever you do, don’t copy us.’ (…) it’s about learning to
believe in your own ideas; it’s about not being so besotted
with one way of saying something or looking at something
that it deprives you of your own voice; it’s about finding
the confidence and the motivation to get real value out of
your education, not just engaging in a blind pursuit to get
letters after your name.
By Prof. Sarah Moore, UL Student Academic Handbook
8. What do students think?
• ‘copying and pasting without citation is wrong’
• ‘I never/rarely copy and paste without citation’
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…%
…%
(when presented with a verbatim plagiarism example)
• ‘this piece of writing is in breach of academic
guidelines’ … %
• ‘a reference is needed’ … %
Risquez, O’Dwyer, Ledwith (2013); Risquez, O’Dwyer,
Ledwith (2011); O’Dwyer, Risquez, Ledwith (2010)
9. So what?
• This suggests that students’
understanding and awareness of
academic breaches would benefit from
experiential learning
• Higher education institutions should not
merely rely on providing statements and
definitions of academic misconduct.
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10. UL resources
• http://www2.ul.ie/pdf/201553623.pdf (Appendix 5:
Plagiarism at College by Prof Sarah Moore)
• http://www.ul.ie/~library/GLIS/html/index.htm (Library
online tutorials on Harvard referencing style, Refworks,
researching with the internet, etc).
Other resources
• http://www.turnitin.com/static/support.html
• http://www.plagiarismadvice.org/
• The Turnitin blog
Available supports
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11. Writing Centre Resources
Free One-to-One Peer
Tutoring
Writers’ Groups
Writers’ Space
Workshops and Seminars
Online Resources
Free resources for all
students
and staff
14. • Paper assignment is the base assignment for all other
assignments types. Used to obtain an Originality Report
• PeerMark assignment: allows students to review their
peers' papers based on scale and free response
questions selected by the instructor.
• Revision Assignment allows students to submit
multiple drafts without overwriting the previous
drafts/submissions
• Reflection Assignment is designed as a learning
journal where students write about what they learned
from the writing process as well as offer feedback on the
assignment they worked on.
Types of “Assignments”
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15. It determines the congruence of text to
sources in:
• Publicly accessible Internet sources
• Every document already submitted to Turnitin*
• Assignments from within the class
Originality Check
* Lecturers can opt out from Turnitin storing papers. Only the lecturer
can access the submitted paper.
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16. • Allows for citation
verification and quickly
provides documentation of
alleged plagiarism
• Detects rewording
• Both lecturer and students
can upload
• It allows for peer to peer
plagiarism detection
• It dos not search
subscription databases
(e.g. Library databases,
newspapers, etc) unless
those materials also
appear in assignments
previously sent to Turnitin.
• It does not differentiate
between quoted materials
and original writing!
PROS
Originality Check
CONS
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17. A greyed-out report icon indicates that the report has not yet been generated.
Please wait a few moments and click your browser’s refresh button (large
reports may take up to 24hh to process)
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Originality Report (1)
An originality report can be generated through the Assignments tool in Sulis
or through a Turnitin account. Once it is ready…
20. 20
Grademark
You can add comments within the body of the paper, point
out grammar and punctuation mistakes, evaluate the paper
against your own rubrics or predefined ones, etc.
And training videos in
http://turnitin.com/en_us/training/instructor-training
Including a very useful interactive tutorial
21. 21
Peermark
Allows students to read, review, and evaluate one or many papers
submitted by their classmates. Instructors can choose whether the
reviews are anonymous or attributed, decide if students should be
excluded from reviews, pair students, and assign students specific
papers to review.
1.33 min
22. Sulis-Turnitin integration
• When your students submit their work in the
Assignment tool in Sulis, a Turnitin originality report
can be also created. You can use the Grademark
features too.
• To do this, just activate the Turnitin feature when you
are creating your Sulis assignment.
Note: you will be able to see the originality report in Turnitin too, but it
is a read only view. If you wish to change the dates for your students
to see feedback using the Grademark features in Turnitin, you will
need to edit these in Sulis.
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24. • Use it proactively
• Notify and explain to your students
• Clear plagiarism policy: definition, avoidance,
guidelines and disciplinary process.
• Train and support students (e.g. trial submission)
• Involve students (e.g. submit themselves)
• Be creative! (e.g. using originality report in
tutorials, peer review and online grading features,
allowing multiple drafts of an assignment…)
Teaching advice
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25. Questions?
Advanced guides, videos, case students and more in
http://turnitin.com/en_us/training/instructor-training
Teaching support and advice from CTL
Technical support available from Turnitin support directly,
(https://www.turnitin.com/help/helpdesk.asp or email
tiisupport@turnitin.com). The Self Service Help Centre
may be helpful also, Turnitin Self-Service Help Center for
quick answers to your questions.
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Editor's Notes
So we think that students need to develop their authorial identity, but what do students think? They may perceive the issue quite a different reality, perhaps they look at it from a very strategic point of view – maximising output for input – or perhaps they think their lecturers are making too much of a deal about it?
Throughout much of the literature on plagiarism in higher education, there is an implicit assumption that students who understand plagiarism, who have high ethical views and declare not to engage in plagiaristic behaviour are able to recognise it and avoid it in practice. Challenging this supposition, this paper contrasts students’ self-reported data with their ability to recognise and avoid plagiarism in a proposed case scenario. A questionnaire was adapted from previous literature and administered to a sample of undergraduate first- and second year students in an Irish university.
The first section of results, examining the students’ self-reported data, shows that 75% of students can be classified as having high ethical views, that is, they agree or strongly agree that in their view, copying text and inserting it in a paper without citation is wrong.
Additionally, 84% of students surveyed report low levels of engagement in plagiarism as they stated that they never or rarely engage in copying text and inserting it in a paper without citation, as is commonly found in other studies.
Therefore, analysis of the data addressing self-reported views and behaviour illustrates that the majority of students hold strong personal ethical views about plagiarism, expect to be punished if caught in fault and also report that they rarely, or never, engage in plagiarism.
It would be expected that these views will transfer into practice as measured in the case scenario. In contrast, only 30% of the students sampled agree that inserting a piece verbatim into their work without a reference constitutes a breach of academic guidelines, although the majority of students (64%) agree that a reference was required in this case.
Results of the predictive analysis showed that self-reported measures are not a powerful predictor of the students’ ability to recognise the practical case
as an academic breach, nor to avoid the breach through referencing.
This suggests that students’ understanding and awareness of academic breaches would benefit from experiential learning and that higher education institutions should not merely rely on providing statements and definitions of academic misconduct.
The Regional Writing Centre, UL offers a free and friendly place for UL students and staff to come and address any aspect of their academic writing.
The Writing Centre is dedicated to helping students of all faculties develop strategies to become more confident, critical and independent writers. Whether you’re writing your thesis or a technical report, essay or FYP, Writing Centre tutors are equipped to support you in any of your academic writing endeavours.
Writing Centre resources for undergrads include free one-to-one peer tutoring in writing, workshops and seminars, access to RWC Writers’ Space, which is a distraction free area in which to write, and online resources such as links to academic writing related website.
Writing Centre resources for Postgrads include free one-to-one peer tutoring in writing, structured Writers’ Groups, workshops and seminars, access to RWC Writers’ Space, which is a distraction free area in which to write, and online resources such as links to academic writing related website.
For any further details visit the Writing Centre in C1-065 in the main building or email them at writingcentre@ul.ie