A revisit to an old post

As I grade sophomore research papers, the idea of plagiarism always sits in the back of mind, so I dutifully check for it. I posted this blog last year and find that I did not get the feedback I wanted. So read Kate Kellen's comments on how her students don't understand the concept of plagiarism in writing. Just when do we teach students about this bane of the English teacher's existence? If elementary students are allowed to copy from the encyclopedia for reports and middle school students are allowed to copy from the Internet and other sources with no regard to summarization, paraphrasing, quoting and citing sources, is it then up to high school teachers to correct years of "damage"? I find that almost unbearable and sometimes impossible. The process of incorporating research into writing takes years of practice- not just four years of the sporadic paper in English classes. I wonder what college English teachers have to say on the topic.

Wikipedia- to use or not to use

McLeod's article is interesting. I don't let my students use Wikipedia as a source in their papers. Should I be? What do think about its readability? What is a wiki any way? Suggestions on use in school?

Cheating

This was a post from last year about this time and it did not receive much discussion. I re-posted it to see if I could generate some this time and to see if we could find some answers to this problem.

As a teacher, I see and hear about all forms of cheating, from copying vocabulary work, to copying and pasting a report, to looking at another's answers on a test, to making up book reports about non-existent books or writing a book report based on not actually reading the book, but on what you have read about the book. Nothing really surprises me anymore.
Read the news report of what happened in Hanover High School in Hanover, NH.
What is this telling us about the current generation?
Are they over-booked with too many academic, activity, job-related and personal commitments that they have no time to do their work, complete assignments, or study for tests?
Are parents or the students themselves putting too much pressure on the students to achieve a good grade that learning takes second place?
Are schools and teachers emphasizing the wrong thing- grades instead of actual learning?
No learning can actually be graded- learning is learning- it changes the brain. How can that be graded?
So what do we and teachers, students and administrators do about cheating?
What is the parental role in this issue?

Making school fun

I realized today that the highlight of a lot of my students' days is lunchtime. Today, as the boys were jockeying for position to be first out the door for the one tray of strawberry cheesecake, all I could think about was, "Boy, I wish they could be that excited about school, learning or just being in class."
It seems that elementary school students love school, have fun in school and actually learn in school, but all that changes in high school. How can a teacher who sees 135 students a day, still inject some "fun" into each class. I can see how an elementary teacher who sees 17-22 students all day, everyday for a whole year can do it and see the gains the kids make.
I start the year trying to make class fun, but the wear and tear of grading, creating assignments, attending conferences, meeting and trainings and dealing the co-and extra-curricular mandates suck my ability to create the fun my students seem to need. And don't forget that I have to teach all the standards enough so students have them down and make sure that all the students reach the proficient or advanced level on the state tests.
So how can high school teachers make class or school fun?
It can't all be a good attitude, an occasional laugh or a joke everyday, can it?