Thread by @ashleystaz1

What are the implications of current educational technologies with respect to formative and summative evaluation and reporting? #bolt677

The biggest concern brought to my attention while teaching online (at least in post-secondary) this past year, has been the concern around plagiarism. It is thought that with a purely online presence, that plagiarism would increase.

Here is a fun online gaming resource to teach academic integrity at a secondary level (or even post-secondary) before I go forward: de.ryerson.ca/games/aio/#/

Sorea et al (2021) note that with the rise of online learning during the pandemic in combination with ready-made solutions online, student appetite for plagiarism is substantially higher. Source: mdpi.com/1055188

APA Citation: Sorea, D., Roșculeț, G., & Bolborici, A.-M. (2021). Readymade Solutions and Students’ Appetite for Plagiarism as Challenges for Online Learning. Sustainability, 13(7), 3861. doi:10.3390/su13073861

So how does this impact formative & summative assessment in a virtual learning environment? First of all, there are extensions that can be added to an LMS, or used independently like @Turnitin, which can detect student plagiarism for summative assessments: turnitin.com

While no program or online platform is foolproof in detecting plagiarism, it is my own pedagogical belief that seeking out plagiarism and spending any extra time I may have investigating potential "academic crimes" in my students is quite simply a waste of my time.

Howard (2001) notes the following, "we risk becoming the enemies rather than the mentors of our students" when our approach is simply to "police" academic integrity.

Source: Howard, R. M. (2001). Forget about policing plagiarism: Just teach. The Chronicle, 11(16), 1-4. abacus.bates.edu/cbb/events/doc…

Howard goes on to state that there is a scale of plagiarism - is it a purchased essay online, or is it forgetting to cite a direct quote? One action will require different consequences than the other.

The two reasons Howard states that students cheat are perhaps because a) students do not value their learning, nor do they find it meaningful, and b) they do not value the opportunity to learn (p. 3).

This is perhaps more applicable in post-secondary whereby if a student is enrolled in a trade program but must take classes where the course content is entirely unrelated to what their desired trade/future employment may be. The same could be applied in a K-12 setting as well.

Pedagogically, I take the approach that all students have my trust and that students who want to cheat will cheat regardless of how I structure my assessments. In order to combat cheating, I follow Howard's suggestions by creating meaningful formative and summative assessments

which are directly applicable to the workforce.

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