Plagiarism
According to Merriam Webster, to plagiarize is "to steal and pass off (the ideas or words of another) as one's own." Plagiarism includes:
- Copying and pasting information into your assignment without providing the source information.
- Passing off another student's paper as your own.
- Failing to put a quotation in quotation marks.
- Not giving proper credit to the source of the information.
- Giving incorrect or made-up information about the source of a quotation.
(Source: Plagiarism.org)
Cutting and pasting from the internet without giving credit has serious consequences: you may fail the assignment, the class, or the year (and if you're caught plagiarizing in university you could be expelled). For more information on plagiarism and how to avoid it, check out the following guides:
Citation
Academic Citation Resource Guide
The only way to avoid plagiarism is to keep track of all the sources you use for your assignment and cite where you obtain each idea you use in your assignment.
When you quote or paraphrase information, you need to provide details about where you found it using the citation style indicated by your teacher. There are three main citation styles: APA, MLA, and Chicago. For more information, check out the citation style guides available from the Purdue University Online Writing Lab.
Citation styles can be complicated, but you can make life a little easier by using a free citation generator. There are many available online, but these are three reliable ones:
Tip: EBSCO provides citations for every article - just click the "Cite" button to the right of whatever article you have open, select your citation style, and you're done!