Sheila,
I like how you say you coach the student.....many students don't thing they need taught how to cite, but coaching seems like a helpful step!
Shelly Crider
I believe you can structure the assignments/tests so that cheating is not really a possibility. As educators we want to challenge students so they are answering questions at a higher level of Bloom's taxonomy. Analysis, Synthesis, and Evaluation don't really lend themselves to "cheating."
Cheating is cheating...
It is a lot easier in the online format, so we take extreme care in ensuring students understand why it is important to submit their own work.
I disagree. Cheating is as much of an issue in online courses as traditional ones. These days the mechanics of turning in assignments and testing are pretty much the same anyway, so it is straightforward to do initial diagnostics like screening papers through Turnitin, watch for patterns of the same groups of people receiving the same grade on exams, etc.
As online educators we need to be especially vigilant about ensuring that our assessment procedures are sound. IMHO the market has not accepted that online courses are as valuable as traditional in-person ones.
Cheating is cheating. Therefore, it is the same and always cause for concern and should be dealt with in the same manner regardless of whether the student is in a grounded classroom or online. Of course, the manner of monitoring for and detecting cheating in an online environment may have unique challenges such as with student identity, but other forms of cheating such as plagiarism would be detected no differently.
I agree. Cheating should be treated the same as in a traditional setting. I have noticed, however, that students tend to do it more often in an online setting. I remember a time when I noticed that someone had gotten a copy of my answer key and wrote, "Answers may vary" as one of their answer responses. That's when I clearly knew, 100%, that cheating had occurred. Pretty bold, huh? I think the absence of being in a face-to-face environment tends to contribute to the frequency of cheating for some reason or another. Just my two cents.
Ashley, I have had a few isolated incidents where students plagiarized but didn't do intentionally. What I mean by this is that they failed to include an in-text citation and reference their source properly. I find this with most students who have been out of school for years and are just not familiar with properly citing sources according to APA. I usually refer them to the Learning Center for additional help as well as give them several links to APA information. I also provide a "sample" paper to use as a guide.
The cheating from traditional classes or online classes should the same and be treated in the same way.
To avoid cheating in online classes, we may use Turnitin in essay assignments. We can get a similarity score from Turnitin as a reference for deciding if a plagiarism occurs.
In quizzes, I think the best way to avoid cheating is to have a big test bank containing multiple questions, so that each different student will get similar or different questions. This will make hard for cheating. If the same questions are used the each students, students may copy answers from students who have taken this class before, or work together with fellow students online or email beside classroom.
To have a big test bank is a challenge for course designers.
Another way is to limit the time for completing the quizzes so that students do not have time to search around from the internet.
Thanks.
erick,
There will be more and more tools out there to detect cheating in the future as well.
Shelly Crider
Kristina,
Indeed!! I love to challenge the students.
Shelly Crider
Nitin,
It is important for students to know why we do not accept cheating. Employers will not accept cheating!
Shelly Crider
Steve,
We do indeed need to be vigilant about our classes and their integrity.
Shelly Crider
Detra,
Great example!!! Some of my students have not been very creative when it comes to cheating as well.
Shelly Crider
Xianbin,
It is good to mix up your questions each term so students do not share answers.
Shelly Crider
It is harder to catch the students in the act of cheating in an online classroom. There are technologies out their that look for plagerism and sites that are off limits for students, such as ones that provide written papers (or that type of service). I still think we should be concerned about cheating in the online classroom, because at the end of the day it is about fairness to other students who are not cheating and academic integrity.
Hello,
I would surely have to disagree with this statement. Before every class begin I post a message entitled, "Academic Dishonesty (A must read)". I take cheating very seriously because I believe that all grades must and should be individually earned. I like to stress that the most effective way of learning a topic is by researching it on your own. I think it is important for all instructors to stress the nature and penalty of cheating so that students will avoid doing it.
Gregory Becoat
I do allow my students a "do over" opportunity because I feel learning should not be a penalty but an opportunity to understand. With this said, the students that really want to learn and understand will take full advantage of this "do over" opportunity and get the assignment correct, where as the students that don't care will not look back.
I do agree that most students just do not understand what plagiarism is or that they are plagiarizing. Better yet, students do not understand how to cite work. Teaching students how to cite work will help them understand plagiarism and therefore, will not plagiarize.
Shelly,
While it is true that students cheat in both an on-ground and on-line environment, we do need to be concerned with cheating. The main purpose of academic courses is the transfer and obtaining of knowledge. As instructors, it is very important to know if this transfer has taken place. We use this information to change/adapt the course to benefit the students. Cheating not only impacts the student who has engaged in it, it impacts all future students who may not benefit from changes to the course that occur from lessons learned through the evaluation process.
Jim
Stephanie,
Yes, I have given students due over due to cheating via plagiarism. I do this for two reasons; I do not want one instance of cheating to affect the student and I like to use this opportunity to engage the student in the proper methodology of research and resource usage. I find that many times (given a second chance)a student will wind up doing a better job on an assignment than they would have done the first (even if they did not cheat).
Thank you for the excellent question.
Jim
