INSTRUCTIONS:
Read through the reading passage below about Plagiarism, and then do the
Plagiarism Pre-test that follows.
Understanding and Avoiding Plagiarism: A Self-Directed Tutorial
. Have you ever handed over a recording of a favourite song and tried to
convince your friend that it was you rather than Nelly Furtado singing?
Perhaps this seems ridiculous, but amazingly some students try to fool
their professors into believing that they created an assignment when in fact
another person wrote the entire paper. This is an extreme example of
plagiarism.
What is Plagiarism?
Plagiarism is using the words or ideas of another person as if they were your
own, and without giving proper credit to the sources you have used. So have
you ever committed plagiarism? After completing this tutorial, some of you
may be surprised to learn that the answer is yes. Students have been known
to unintentionally commit plagiarism because they did not understand what it
meant.
This tutorial is designed to educate you about plagiarism and provide you
with important skills and knowledge to avoid committing plagiarism.
Learning Objectives
After completing this tutorial, you should be able to
 Understand why avoiding plagiarism is important
 Recognize plagiarism in its various forms
 Develop skills for avoiding plagiarism These skills include
o
o
o
o
Citing Sources
Note-Taking
Quoting
Paraphrasing

Plagiarism: Consequences
Through completing the above test you learned about several
forms of plagiarism. Hopefully you already knew that buying a
paper online or re-typing a friend’s paper are forms of plagiarism.
However, other forms of plagiarism are more subtle. Did you know
that you can commit plagiarism by:
 using someone else’s idea (even if you express it your own
words) and not citing the original source?
 forgetting quotation marks?
 taking a short passage from another source and not rewriting it in your own words?
Do Students Really Plagiarize?
Unfortunately, the answer is yes. Take a moment to read this
Peak article on a well-known incident of plagiarism at SFU a few
years ago which involved more than 40 students.
http://www.peak.sfu.ca/the-peak/2002-3/issue9/ne-cheat.html
The Consequences of Committing Plagiarism
Depending on the case, penalties for academic
dishonesty at SFU are very severe and range from
reprimand, to failure in a course, to suspension. See
the “Resources” section at the end of this tutorial for
links to the relevant SFU policies on plagiarism.
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Office
Online
How Can Plagiarism Be Avoided?
The remainder of this tutorial is designed to give you skills and
knowledge to help you avoid plagiarism
Plagiarism Pre-test
Can you recognize plagiarism? Test yourself by deciding whether each of the following
examples is plagiarism or not.
Question 1: It’s the night before your paper is due, and you haven’t done any work. You
buy a paper from an online essay-mill. Is this plagiarism?
(a) Yes, it's plagiarism.
(b) No, it isn't.
(d) Don't know
Question 2: Your friend did the course last year, and he gives you his paper. You re-type
the whole paper, changing words here and there and inserting a few of your own ideas. Is
this plagiarism?
(a) Yes, it's plagiarism.
(b) No, it isn't.
(d) Don't know
Question 3: You need an image for your essay. You go online and find one. You don’t
cite the source of your image, because images on the web aren’t protected by copyright.
Is this plagiarism?
(a) Yes, it's plagiarism.
(b) No, it isn't.
(d) Don't know
Question 4: You copy a paragraph directly from an article you found. You cite the
source, but you forget to put quotation marks. Is this plagiarism?
(a) Yes, it's plagiarism.
(b) No, it isn't.
(d) Don't know
Question 5: You find a neat idea in an article, so you use it in your paper. You don’t
bother to cite the source of the idea because you’ve expressed it in your own words. Is
this plagiarism?
(a) Yes, it's plagiarism.
(b) No, it isn't.
(d) Don't know
Question 6: You copy a short passage from an article you found. You change a couple of
words, so that it’s different than the original – this way you don’t need quotation marks.
You carefully cite the source. Is this plagiarism?
(a) Yes, it's plagiarism.
(b) No, it isn't.
(d) Don't know
Question 7: You pay a tutor for editing assistance, and he drastically re-writes your
original paper. You hand in this new edited version to your professor. Is this plagiarism?
(a) Yes, it's plagiarism.
(b) No, it isn't.
(d) Don't know