Assignment plagiarism is very serious and very common. Some students copy from books while others copy someone elses work from YouTube.
You Tube is great study tool and I certainly recommend using it to get ideas and motivation to complete your assignment.
A commonly copied YouTube Video.
Have you heard or seen Charlie the Unicorn. It is a popular YouTube Video.
Have you seen it yet?
The first time I watched the video was two months ago. But I have read many student assignments that are exact copies of it.
You can check it out below.
Charlie the Unicorn has been on You Tube since January 2008 and watched 3,965,770 times. It is rated Number 16 for Top Favorite for Film and Television.
It is a simple story of 3 unicorns – blue, pink and white. Blue and Pink unicorn want to go to “Candy Mountain”, white does not.
What does this have to do with Study Skills or Plagiarism?
Plagiarism is copying someone’s work and using it as your own. It is stealing. You know what plagiarism is and I am sure you receive countless lessons on how to properly reference internet sites, journals and books at school.
Well the same idea applies to You Tube my friend. It is still Plagiarism.
But back to Charlie the Unicorn. Here are some observations:
1. My Year 8 class had to complete a writing assignment. Specifically they had to write picture books for our Junior School students. 3 were very similar and involved two unicorns. When they were read aloud to the class I heard mumblings of “that’s Charlie”, “that’s from You Tube”
2. After watching the video I had flashbacks to a certain assignment from a Yr 3 boy.
3. That same boy, now in Yr 5, just submitted an assignment to his teacher. You guessed it, it was Charlie.
I am thinking that there may be more students copying this video that just these 4 kids. You see it is the most popular You Tube Video for males and females aged 13 to 17.
Assignments are hard work.
If you copy someone’s work then you are just lazy. And disrespectful. And intentionally plagiarizing. Homework and assignments are there for you to develop skills in research and writing. If all you do is cheat the whole time then you won’t have developed any effective academic skills at all.
So do yourself a favor: Don’t take the easy option. Use your own ideas and do your own assignments.
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{ 2 comments… read them below or add one }
that’s like the year they wrote halloween themed short stories and one kid turned in what can only be described as a pastiche of every horror movie that had been out in the last 6 months.
Too true. Students have become accustomed from an early age to plagiarise. They need help to break the cycle and feel the success of writing your own piece