After class on Thursday, 20 January, Melanie approached me about the possibility that the writing piece – the speech on the fear of public speaking (here’s the handout: Grade 8 Writing Sample – Fear of Public Speaking) we assessed in class might have been plagiarized to some degree.
Sure enough, after a bit of checking, Melanie discovered that much of it was online and pointed me to two websites:
- Pioneer Thinking: Shyness Still Misunderstood and Often Underestimated
- Social Anxiety.com: Still Misunderstood and Often Underestimated, Shyness Remains Anxiety Disorder of the Milennium
This brings to mind a whole slew of interesting questions:
- What constitutes plagiarism?
- How to you find out if a student has plagiarized?
- How did this piece make it through the exemplar selection process without anyone noticing the plagiarism?
- How does the fact the the piece is plagiarized affect your assessment of it?
- How do you approach a student who you think might have plagiarized a piece?
- What steps can teachers take to reduce instances of plagiarism by their students?
Food for thought for an upcoming LLED class, perhaps.
Check out this video of another guy busted for his irresponsibility:
[youtube]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=r2ZXLS_TvXM&feature=fvst[/youtube]
– Lawrence