Plagerism and Facts

[NikiM20]

DD9 is in 5th grade and it is social studies fair time ..yippee skippy
So DD wrote her paper and included some facts. She reworded the facts and used them in her paper. Her teacher is saying she plagerized and said she could be suspended or expelled. I looked up plagerism and all it says is if you use someone elses ideas. A fact is a fact and if it it is not copied directly from the book is it plagerism? I think no, opinions please

ETA--As far as citing, her teacher did not mention that, just that it needs to be in her words and not copied from a book. They were not taught about citing

 

[Soarin08]

No, I don't think that's plagiarism. In high school we defined it as directly quoting someone else's work and not giving them due credit. I wouldn't say putting facts (such as "The largest state in the Union is Alaska.") is plagiarism. How else can you state a fact?

She's in 5th grade!!! Please!! That teacher needs to lighten up a bit!

 

[Cindyluwho]

Without knowing all the details of the paper/project I'd have to say that facts are facts. You can't NOT list the facts of a certain subject if that's the subject you're writing about. I'm guessing the teacher is talking about the "wording" of the material? Just email the teacher or call her and ask for specifics. Teachers usually don't mind questions about this kind of thing if you ask politely and don't automatically assume your child is in the right and that the teacher is in the wrong.

 

[Handbag Lady]

Schools are so silly these days, I don't know how you parents deal with it.




Maybe the teacher's idea of a fact isn't what you know as a fact?


But if you say that the bicentennial was in 1976 and she says you are plagarizing that fact, then she's nuts.

 

[MM27]

This is an excerpt from http://www.plagiarism.org/learning_center/plagiarism_faq.html

Are all published works copyrighted?
Actually, no. The Copyright Act only protects works that express original ideas or information. For example, you could borrow liberally from the following without fear of plagiarism:

Compilations of readily available information, such as the phone book
Works published by the U.S. government
Facts that are not the result of original research (such as the fact that there are fifty U.S. states, or that carrots contain Vitamin A)
Works in the public domain (provided you cite properly)
Can facts be copyrighted?
Yes, in some situations. Any "facts" that have been published as the result of individual research are considered the intellectual property of the author.

 

[NikiM20]

Ok here is an example of one of the facts
DD wrote-Louisiana is losing 25-35 square miles of wetlands every year.

it is the same fact, just reworded from the book. But it is a fact, so DD just reworded again and said 25-35 sq miles of La wetlands are lost every year.

There are only so many ways you can reword something and still keep it as a fact.

As far as contacting the teacher, I have tried talking to her over and over, but I once made suggestions on how to help with DD in the class (she has ADHD) and she told me I needed to adjust dd's meds. So that is what I am dealing with

 

[bekkiz]

To get technical (and I was a sixth grade history teacher), yes, anything you get from another source needs to be cited. Of course, it can get ridiculous when you cite every sentence in a paper, but I always told my students it's far better to over cite than under cite. Teachers want to know where the information was learned ( ie from a book, not wikipedia).

A couple of things I would want to ask the teacher:
1) What has been taught in the class about citation and references? Are they to use a particular format (like MLA etc), or is there a specific way they were asked to do their citations?
2) Was there some sort of handout for the students to follow?
3) Are there school guidelines regarding plagerism and punishment, and have these specifically been taught to the students? (I doubt a 5th grader can comprehend these ideas without instruction)

My guess is that expulsion is a total overeaction, and suspension might be over the top as well, but it's hard to know without seeing the assignment, the work and knowing the answers to the above questions.

eta: The fact you provided is something I would want cited by my students, assuming I had taught them how to do that...

 

[Soarin08]

Schools are so silly these days, I don't know how you parents deal with it.




Maybe the teacher's idea of a fact isn't what you know as a fact?


But if you say that the bicentennial was in 1976 and she says you are plagarizing that fact, then she's nuts.

That's what I'm saying. This isn't English Composition II where she's writing a ten page research paper (like I just did). It's fifth grade!! I mean... that's nuts.

 

[mirmartinez]

DD9 is in 5th grade and it is social studies fair time ..yippee skippy
So DD wrote her paper and included some facts. She reworded the facts and used them in her paper. Her teacher is saying she plagerized and said she could be suspended or expelled. I looked up plagerism and all it says is if you use someone elses ideas. A fact is a fact and if it it is not copied directly from the book is it plagerism? I think no, opinions please

I do not know the school policy, however, plagerism can result from not siting sources, incorrectly citing sources, etc.....

I agree with the logic a fact is a fact, therefore not someone elses idea, however, I had a teacher that made us cite everything that was not general knowledge. (Louisiana is losing 25-35 square miles of wetlands every year, would not be general knowledge)

 

[crashbb]

Ok here is an example of one of the facts
DD wrote-Louisiana is losing 25-35 square miles of wetlands every year.

it is the same fact, just reworded from the book. But it is a fact, so DD just reworded again and said 25-35 sq miles of La wetlands are lost every year.

There are only so many ways you can reword something and still keep it as a fact.

As far as contacting the teacher, I have tried talking to her over and over, but I once made suggestions on how to help with DD in the class (she has ADHD) and she told me I needed to adjust dd's meds. So that is what I am dealing with

Honestly, I would say that that is a "fact" that does need to be cited. It is not something like "there are 50 states in the USA" - it is not the sort of fact that everyone just knows. Rewording something, doesn't take away from needing to cite it (it just takes away needing to put it in quotes).

 

[Tigger&Belle]

Sounds as if the teacher is going overboard. Yes, like bekkiz said, anything that is repeated from any source should be cited. However, these are children who are learning. I'm back in college, having to relearn all about citations and references, and how to reword and then cite is something we've recently learned. Even in college the profs want us to learn how to do it, not threaten us if we didn't do it exactly right. And for your dd, this should all be a learning experience.

 

[MM27]

To get technical (and I was a sixth grade history teacher), yes, anything you get from another source needs to be cited. Of course, it can get ridiculous when you cite every sentence in a paper, but I always told my students it's far better to over cite than under cite. Teachers want to know where the information was learned ( ie from a book, not wikipedia).

A couple of things I would want to ask the teacher:
1) What has been taught in the class about citation and references? Are they to use a particular format (like MLA etc), or is there a specific way they were asked to do their citations?
2) Was there some sort of handout for the students to follow?
3) Are there school guidelines regarding plagerism and punishment, and have these specifically been taught to the students? (I doubt a 5th grader can comprehend these ideas without instruction)

My guess is that expulsion is a total overeaction, and suspension might be over the top as well, but it's hard to know without seeing the assignment, the work and knowing the answers to the above questions.

eta: The fact you provided is something I would want cited by my students, assuming I had taught them how to do that...

First, your babies are adorable

I agree with the part about what exactly was taught in the class about citing work. I teach 4th grade and I do research type projects with them in class. Many kids believe that they can go on a website, print out a page and put their name on the top and hand that in. If it's not being taught, they can't be expected to know how to cite sources.

 

[bigtinkfun]

I think her teacher needs to get a grip on herself. This is elementary school, not a college level paper. Not even a high school paper. Or even, even a middle school paper. At a fifth grade level, kids need to be learning how to write a coherent sentence and shape reasoned paragraphs into a paper with a measure of logic and consistency. They need to learn to research a subject, digest what they've learned and then present that information in writing to an audience that may know nothing about the topic in such a way that their readership can take away a bit of meaning from the experience.

Plagiarism can be a difficult thing even for adults to decide and agree upon. To introduce the idea to a classroom full of youngsters who are nervous enough about writing a paper as it is, is, well, self-important, pointless and mean. I mean, jeez, let the kids learn to write first. Instill in them a love of researching and studying a subject and conveying what they've learned in a written form. They can worry about plagiarism when they get to late middle school and high school.

As a writer, I think your DD's teacher is full of herself and she needs to come down to earth and realize that what really matters in this lesson is that her students learn to love learning and the process of writing. I really object to putting the fear of G-d into kids that young that they may "steal" someone's idea or particular form of expression or fail to cite a source correctly. If she wants to teach her students to hate writing, she's well on her way.

Tell your daughter an actual, honest-to-goodness writer thinks she's done just fine.

Tell your daughter's teacher that she's attempting to teach above these kids' comprehension level and that she's probably only succeeding in scaring them and turning them away from the joy of research and writing. And that an actual, honest-to-goodness writer objects to that.

 

[agnes!]

I like citing as much as anybody else, but this teacher is way off-base. Btw, does Miss Teach cite all her sources in all her work? I think *not*.

agnes!

 

[Seewhatimesdone]

Pretty much everything anyone says historically is some sort of plagerism...

 

[seashoreCM]

In general it is not plagiarism when you state or even quote a small portion of someone else's work when you also specify (in a footnote or bibliography) the work in question.

For the fifth grade level the devil's advocate question would be, "where did you learn that?". The kids are probably too young to learn all the intricacies of footnoting and probably should not be held down to remembering and including the volume numbers of magazines and the page numbers of the books they read.

Did this teacher discuss the subject of footnotes and bibliographies in class?

Generally, if the same "fact" is seen unfootnoted in several references, no footnote is needed; the fact can be assumed to be "common knowledge".

One thought running through my mind was having the teacher go through and red-line your DD's composition, pointing out what was plagiarized and how, without a back and forth dialog between the teacher and DD or between the teacher and you.

 

[monkey68]

I was taught that if it's found in 3 or more sources, it's considered common knowledge and doesn't need to get cited. So saying something like "There are 50 states in the USA" doesn't need to get cited because it's common knowledge, I can easily find 3 books that say that. As far as plagarism goes, I think I was always taught that facts can't really be plagarised, but ideas are where they are more concerned with plagarism. There are only so many ways you can state a fact.

 

[NikiM20]

In general it is not plagiarism when you state or even quote a small portion of someone else's work when you also specify (in a footnote or bibliography) the work in question.

For the fifth grade level the devil's advocate question would be, "where did you learn that?". The kids are probably too young to learn all the intricacies of footnoting and probably should not be held down to remembering and including the volume numbers of magazines and the page numbers of the books they read.

Did this teacher discuss the subject of footnotes and bibliographies in class?
Generally, if the same "fact" is seen in several references, no footnote is needed; the fact can be assumed to be "common knowledge".

One thought running through my mind was having the teacher go through and red-line your DD's composition, pointing out what was plagiarized and how, without a back and forth dialog between the teacher and DD or between the teacher and you.

They did discuss bibliographys and there is a bibliograpy attached to the paper, along with a table of contents, abstract, and conclusion

 

[Bluestars]

I think the teacher over-reacted when she told your daughter she could get suspended or expelled. She sounds like a very strict teacher. One of my kids had a very strict teacher for 4th grade. The teacher would have been more suited to teach at the high school level. It was a very long year. Even though it was years ago, when anyone says her name now we all cringe.

I guess you can look at it as you have been warned and now know what the teacher expects, even though her expectations may not be reasonable for a 5th grader.

 

[Eeyores Butterfly]

I am in graduate school and any time you put in a "fact" that is not considered your idea. Unless something is considered common knowledge, it must be cited. This is whether it is a direct quote or paraphrase. Very rarely is something considered common knowledge enough that I can use it without a citation. If she is using facts, she obviously got them from somewhere and that is indeed considered to be plagiarism if she did not cite.

Now, being that she is in 5th grade and has not been taught how to cite, that teacher WAY over reacted! Even if she had taught them how to cite, it is not approriate to threaten to suspend or expel a 5th grader for lack of citation. If she were my student, I would simply ask her to go back and cite her sources. If it were ongoing I would have a talk about the dangers of plagiarism and maybe dock her grade- but that would be a last resort!

This does not sound like a very good teacher.