Definitions and Tips
The answers to the following questions will provide you with the basic tools necessary to maintain your integrity when writing your assignments:
- How do you define academic fraud?
- How do you define plagiarism?
- How do you cite sources correctly?
- How do you paraphrase ideas that you integrate in your work?
- How do you summarize ideas from texts you consult?
ACADEMIC FRAUD
University of Ottawa's Policy on Academic Fraud defines it as "an act by a student that may result in a false academic evaluation of that student or of another student." For more details, please consult the section Definition of the Policy.
PLAGIARISM
Plagiarism refers mainly to using words, sentences and ideas from various sources and passing them as your own by deliberately or unintentionally omitting to quote or reference them correctly.
Plagiarism may also take other forms:
- Forgetting to place between quotations words and sentences borrowed from other authors;
- Using information from the Internet as public information that you simply copy and paste into your work;
- Translating texts without indicating the source and without any reference to the original text;
- Poorly paraphrasing or summarizing information.
QUOTING
Quoting refers to using an author's exact words in support of your own arguments. A citation must appear between quotation marks in the text and must be referenced using a footnote or an endnote.
Tips:
- Ask your professors about the reference style used in the course or in your discipline;
- Take good notes while doing your research and readings so that you can easily retrace the sources used and accurately use a text;
- Use the resources available at the Academic Writing Help Centre (AWHC). Here you can find useful reference materials.
- Register for workshops offered by the Student Academic Success Service (SASS) to improve your study skills, for example your note-taking skills.
PARAPHRASING
Paraphrasing refers to rewording the ideas of an author you are citing.
Tips:
- To paraphrase an author's ideas correctly, select the passage that you want to use and rewrite the ideas in it using your own words and your own writing style.
- Do not simply replace words with their synonyms - this is not paraphrasing; a misused synonym may sometimes be inaccurate and change the original meaning.
SUMMARIZING
Summarizing means reporting an author's main ideas, namely briefly presenting in your own words the ideas transmitted by an author in a text cited in your research.
Tips:
- Focus on the most important parts of a text, for instance on a thesis or supporting arguments used by the author.
- Prepare a list of questions to answer in order to determine the most important ideas in the text you are summarizing.