Post by Richard Rector
Re: Research paper feedback
100% plagiarizing this idea.
Research paper feedback
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As my course is a senior capstone research course, the final product will be a research paper in scientific format. There are several assignments along the way that allow them to submit drafts of the different sections of the final paper (introduction, materials & methods, results, etc.). I plan on giving them formative assessment (lots of comments) that are designed to help them improve their writing and also get them producing components of the final product.
An assignment that we have in our WR course requires students to break down and understand a scientific publication by rewriting it for a general, non-science audience. Because the assignment has the students interpret and translate the paper into nontechnical writing, there is always a temptation to plagiarize the original paper by using too many phrases that they don't understand, but just sound fancy. When I noticed too many students were having this issue, I attributed it to students not understanding how to paraphrase, so we developed an assignment that walked them through the process of paraphrasing and allowed more formative assessment prior to the final paper being written.