Well that being said, essay two of Klingon 101 was due last Thursday and sure enough I get one very suspicious looking text. The evil person that I am, suspecting that my students are up to no good, I checked by typing random sentences into Google Translate. And, sure enough, from the hot mess that is the Klingon Essay I get a perfectly fine eloquent English translation. So in before class today, I gave everyone their essay drafts back and asked the student in question to please come and talk to me after class about her essay. This was, of course, a private conversation that no one else heard. When class began the first thing we did was to read the wonderful policy on academic integrity that is on the syllabus out loud again. Now, I had a class of 15 confused student and one very embarrassed student that would not look up from her paper.
After class the student came up to me and apologized after admitting that she used an online translator for her essay. No surprise their. So I told her again what the consequences of being caught are. Her excuse was that she just did not know what to write. WHAT? We give our students plenty of example sentences in their book and workbook. We even do this exercise as a partner interview in class. The question for Klingon 101 essay two is: "Write 6 sentences about your daily routine". Something along the lines of: I get up at 7am. I shower. Then I eat breakfast. I go to school at 8am. etc.... I guess for a college student these days this is a terribly complicated question that requires much thinking and contemplation. And now, I really don't know what to write or say to this anymore either.... Other than:
"Dear student,
I hope it was worth the 5 seconds you saved by using the online translator vs. rewriting the example sentences in the book or workbook.
Sincerely,
your highly annoyed Professor."
If you only get one student plagiarizing, I need to know your secrets. You are a Master Teacher, the Yoda of non-plagiarizing.
ReplyDeleteThe problem is that most of these sentences are false. If they were honest they would have to say:
ReplyDeleteI get up at 8:55 am.
I stagger into class at 9:05.
I take a nap at 10.
It is hard to invent clever lies that impress the teacher.
Ka'plah! (Klingon for success)
Most of the language teachers I've known don't really care whether the students are speaking truthfully, as long as they are speaking grammatically. My spouse had a language teacher whose assignment set included "call me in my office and make up a reason why you can't come to class today."
DeleteDoes that definition of plagiarism stand up at your university? I mean, obviously it's lazy and you are well within your prerogative to ban online translators for such assignments. But I assume the student actually produced the essay, ran it through the translator, and handed it in. In my mind, it seems distinct from them going online somewhere, directly copying a Klingon essay, and pasting that instead? So, do you pursue these instances with your university? Putting the students on-file as known plagiarists? Does it stick if they fight it with your integrity council?
ReplyDeleteBy your definition of plagiarism, a student using a calculator instead of showing their work could be accused of plagiarism. After all, the calculator's programming did the actual work.
Most student handbook definitions of "Academic Integrity" include plagiarism and other forms of cheating under a single broad category of misdeeds. Given that the student is copy-pasting words produced by someone else into their work, it's as close to that as it is to "copying the assignment from someone else"
DeleteMy previous institutions cut things a bit more thinly into things like egregious plagiarism, unintentional plagiarism, cheating, and other things. Egregious plagiarism would be copying an entire paper, and rearranging the paragraphs to hide that fact. Students could be immediately expelled for one instance of egregious plagiarism. Unintentional plagiarism would be forgetting citations, quoting a source too much, etc. It was a slightly lesser offense. Cheating would include looking at your neighbors answers on a test or such.
DeleteI'm not defending what the student did, as it was lazy and rightly got them a 0, as the homework made no sense. My argument is that the student could have done the exact same thing with a dictionary, writing out the essay first then translating it word-by-word. Is that really plagiarism? Or is it the fact they used a computer to speed up the process?
I really think we need to be careful how we define and handle plagiarism, as serious accusations have serious consequences. I've done some work on some academic integrity councils, and when accused students come up to defend themselves in these pseudo-legal circumstances, it's important to be as specific in language, deed, and repercussions as possible.
The fact it's verboten on the syllabus is fine with me for the 0, but if the student protested the accusation of plagiarism and ended up in front of the academic integrity council, I probably vote to acquit.
Have you ever studied a foreign language? This is nothing like using a calculator. Using a _dictionary_ is the equivalent of using a calculator. If you want fluency, which is presumably the goal of foreign language instruction, you have to memorize the words and grammar. Online translation completely defeats the purpose.
DeleteYeah, I studied several foreign languages, years ago. Back then online translators were terrible, although it was fun to write a sentence, translate it to something, then translate it back. The results were usually hilarious. The technology has obviously gotten a lot better.
DeleteI'm not arguing that I think students will become fluent in a language using an online translator. What I am saying is that an eloquent student could rightfully argue that the use of such a tool, while lazy and cheating in terms of skipping steps on the intended learning of the lesson, did not commit plagiarism. Depending on the school, this may or may not matter. In places I have previously taught at, if you use the word and actually accuse a student of plagiarism, you initiate a serious time-suck of a process, and not one easily solved by a reading of the syllabus.
I feel your pain, I really do. But has it come so far down that you have to make your students read the syllabus aloud to ensure that they read it?
ReplyDeleteCheese and crackers!
I blame college administrators for this. The "Retention At All Costs" mindset needs to be expunged. I'm about to channel Strelnikov.
If the Soviets could have held on for a few more years, they could have just waded ashore and taken over.
Ugh, Klingon!
ReplyDeleteBe prepared to address the "I need to take a trip to the Klingon Homeworld to assist my grandmother with her Klingon Pain-Sticks ritual for old-age."