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Teaching Citation & Academic Integrity Guide

Citation Knowledge-Check & Discussion

Purpose: This in-class activity is intended to briefly gather information on students' familiarity and experience with citing sources and citation styles, as well as introduce the concept that information has value. Students will discuss the reasons for citing sources beyond simply avoiding plagiarizing work.

Prep: Students will complete a short Knowledge Check (series of questions) via Google Form either before class as homework or at the start of class. The students' answers will then be used as a jumping off point for discussion. 

Audience Level: This activity can be used with lower- or upper-division students. 

Notes on Use: This discussion can be used as a lead in to the paraphrasing activity and the citation puzzle activities.

Teaching Mechanics / Citation Puzzle

Purpose: These activities are intended to help students master the mechanics of their discipline-specific citation style (e.g. APA, MLA, Chicago). 

Prep: Most of these activities require students to understand citation basics. Instructors can adapt activities to a particular citation style, so students may also need a quick overview of the style guide used for the activities. 

Audience Level: These activities may be modified to suit lower- or upper-division classes. Many of the activities can be reused, and instructors may choose to gradually increase the difficulty level and/or reduce scaffolding or other supports as students become more familiar with certain skills.

Notes on Use: These activities can be used as quick review activities during leftover class time, or they can be integrated into the research and writing process. The online options could also serve as independent practice outside of class.

How To Paraphrase

Purpose: These activities are intended to introduce students to the concept of paraphrasing and provide opportunities to practice paraphrasing and appropriate accompanying citation.

Prep: For the in-class activity, you will need to identify a paragraph or small section of a text in your discipline. This can be a class reading or a scholarly article, novel, book chapter, etc.

Audience Level: This activities can be used in any level of class. For lower-level classes you will likely require more discussion and examples. These activities can also serve as a review for upper-level students.

Notes on Use: The same text used for the in-class paraphrasing activity can be used for the backward-forward searching activity and several citation puzzle activities.

Following a Citation Trail

Purpose: The purpose of these activities is to help students identify parts of a citation, learn about an information source from its citation, and locate related research by mining a bibliography for additional information sources.

Prep: Students will need to have a reading with a bibliography, works cited, or notes section that they can use to find additional sources. This could be a class reading or something they students find themselves.

Audience Level: This activity would work best with upper-level students working on more comprehensive research projects. 

Notes on Use: The activity Forward & Backward Searching Mini Lit Review may be used as a homework assignment or in-class activity. We recommend having students try to find one source on their own before working together on the in-class activity. The Backwards Reference Search Worksheet can also be used as a homework assignment or in-class activity.