1. © University of Reading 2010 www.reading.ac.uk/library
Library
‘What did I do wrong?’
Supporting independent learning
practices to avoid plagiarism
Helen Hathaway

2. ‘What did I do wrong?’
• Introduction to project
• Rationale and aims
• Project team: Library, Study Advice, ISLC
Helen
Hathaway
Kim
Shahabudin
Clare
Nukui
Liz
Wilding
Rhianedd
Smith

3. Background and scope
• Funding
• Three projects into one
• Timing! Start September 2012, finish June 2013
– Interim report Dec 2012
• Where have we been
• Where are we going

4. What do others think?
We carried out research…
…with Library staff
…with students
…with academics
…on Turnitin Copyright Science Photo Library

5. Library staff views
• “The most frequent query I get is about citing webpages or documents
found on the web. Sometimes they aren’t suitable sources though, so I
have to try to steer them to something better!”
• “Most of my enquiries from students come from opposite ends of the
spectrum:
1) The students who have had a piece of work back saying they
haven’t referenced properly or who know that they have no idea
about referencing
2) The student who’s sorted most of their references and has an
unusual type of material to reference”
• “A lot of the students that I deal with are overseas and tend to get the
plagiarism warnings piled on to them big style so I tend to
recommend it as a way of avoiding charges of plagiarism.”

6. Put yourself in a student’s shoes…
“How should I reference an App,
a packet of crisps, a practical
protocol?”
“How many sources should I
use?”
“I know what a reference is – but
what’s a citation?”
“Why does this tutor want a
different referencing style
from that one?”
“Do I need a reference list AND a
bibliography?”
“Will I be marked down for
missing a comma?”
“I have a misconduct interview:
what happens now?”
Copyright Photolibrary

7. Student comments
• “Did referencing at school so don’t need to learn it again.”
• “Didn’t do referencing at school – was totally lost when I got here.”
• “One tutor wants me to reference like this, the others want me to
do it differently – I don’t understand why.”
• “I got my referencing wrong in my first year and my tutor took me
on one side and told me to be more careful next time. Got it wrong
in the 2nd year and suddenly it was all regulations and zero marks.”
• “Referencing is just something you have to do, otherwise you lose
marks.”
• “I ran out of time, and decided I’d lose fewer marks for not
checking my references than for handing in late. I got zero.”

8. Surveyed School Directors
of teaching and learning
• Advice and guidance on finding appropriate academic
sources of info
• Referencing principles and practice
• Feedback – when and how
• How important for Part 1, Part 2, Masters
• What are the reasons for incorrect referencing
• What is your response
• Current strategies effective or not
• Additional resources you would like?

9. Feedback from academics
• “Inadvertent plagiarism' is usually explained by people being under
pressure.”
• “Plagiarism can be less of a problem on modules where assignments
are designed to force students to think independently.”
• “Anecdotally it seems that anxiety about referencing is seen more with
dissertations. “
• “Students can focus disproportionately on micro-details like p/pp.”
• “There is a growing problem with students in English Literature
referencing e-books. “
• “International students may have been to a vast range of different
types of colleges and universities and it is very hard to know what
training and information they've been given in the past.”

10. Turnitin
Survey of School Directors of Teaching and Learning and School E-
learning Co-ordinators….and others
Results: evenly balanced
• “Definitely worth using Turnitin formatively, but does require
sufficient time - students often need more practice in note-taking
etc.”
• “personally I haven't detected any significant decline in poor
academic practice”
• “Turnitin is not necessarily reliable. It often fails to detect
plagiarism. However it helps to sensitise students of good academic
conventions.”

11. Utilising alternative perspectives?

12. How is it taught now?: identifying gaps
At Reading… At other institutions…

13. What are we developing?
• ‘Toolkit’ of re-purposable resources
• Aimed at academics to use with their students
• Stored in Blackboard Organisation
Example: How to précis and paraphrase
Handout Slides Screencast

14. How are we getting on together?
Good
• input from people
working in different roles
• access to different
strategic issues
• differing relationships
with students and
academics
• paid project workers
Bad
• speed of decision making
• getting together at the
same time!
• differing aspirations for
the project
• different structures of
services/depts.
No ugly!
Copyright Getty Images

15. Summary and recommendations
• Crucial to go beyond formatting and show role of correct
referencing in academic writing
• Many students fail to engage with skills teaching
• Students report lack of consistency and difficulty in finding
guidance
• Recognise implications of alternative academic cultures
• Pre-entry information and compulsory self-test
• Bite sized resources for academics to use/direct students to
• Single, clear authoritative source of guidance for the future ?