O5: Avoiding plagiarism in online courses

O5Avoiding plagiarism in online courses

Just like a face-to-face course, an online course is designed to encourage your intellectual growth and confidence. It is crucial to this process that you offer your own contributions throughout the course. It may seem obvious that students should submit their own work; however, in online classes, the chances of unintentionally plagiarizing—presenting the words or ideas of others as your own—may be especially high. When students write online, the temptation to copy and paste text from outside sources without citations can be greater than it is for on-site classes. Also, some students may be unfamiliar with the conventions of academic source citation and may plagiarize source material accidentally because they do not know how to cite it. Finally, some students might unintentionally plagiarize source material in their forum posts because they consider discussion forums a more casual environment, similar to an in-class discussion in which participants are not usually expected to cite their sources formally. However, whether you are submitting a weekly forum post or an end-of-term formal research project, it is important to correctly cite the sources you have used to complete your work. Understanding how to avoid plagiarism not only protects you from academic penalties but also enriches your own participation in the course.