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ESL forum > Concerning worksheets > Just a simple observation to Victor    

Just a simple observation to Victor



lizsantiago
Puerto Rico

Just a simple observation to Victor
 
Since the new rules I have noticed that we have had a rain of ws of readings with no exercises or activities, 90% of this ws are just copy paste from the web and I know that because in some of them you can see the different color links underline in some of the words. The problem with this is that some of them are easy to find on the net and reported as copies but some of them are harder but still you know they are just copies, and on top of that now we dont have as many moderators as before so it �s very hard to check all of them �. to make it worse we only have a day to check them. Today I spotted more than ten like this, i reported the few i could easily found the other will probably take the space in the server and will be of no use. So I would like to suggest Victor to take this into consideration. At least this is my humble opinion.

9 Mar 2010      





Bruna Dutra
Brazil

Hi, Liz. I haven �t noticed THAT many simple texts, but to tell you the truth, I don �t see the point of a reading without any exercises added to it. Even if it is original, it means that the teacher would have to work to get some exercises done, and not that I am lazy, or anything, but if I �m going to make a ws on a reading, I would use something from the net to my students, related to their interests.... and we are not writers, we are teachers.

Anyways, I totally agree with your point, and I guess this will bring us more and more copies from the net because some users may think they won �t get checked if people know they can send text-only wss (if original).

Hugs, Bruna.

9 Mar 2010     



Yulia Mo
Russian Federation

Liz, this is a very painful topic. I see SO MANY copies every day it is really hard to check them all. And in fact i do not think that those texts appear because people post them as original. They just appear for the same reason as many other copies. The problem is it is very time consuming to check the links and sometimes i just download the wss because i do not have time to type myself. And tomorrow i am back to work and i will not even have the time i used to have to check the copies.
I think that the original reading thing should not be on the rules, it would make our lives so much easier as we would not have to check the texts we know are not original. There are lots of theoretical works published which simply cannot be the creation of the user and i cannot always find links to prove it so it stays because i know if i report is as a non esl it will not be removed.
May be something should change in the rules to make our work easier. It is a constant never ending battle that we are not winning at the moment.

9 Mar 2010     



darryl_cameron
Hong Kong

 
Hi Guys!!!
 
May I suggest you try one of the many plagiarism checkers around. They do the searching for you.
 
Here is a quick and easy browser based one:
 
 
but there are many to download such as:
 
 
It �s a case of catch me if you can ... Tongue

9 Mar 2010     



joy2bill
Australia

I agree with Lizsantiago that reducing the number of moderators must be putting a huge burden on the ones we still have.
 

9 Mar 2010     



victor
Spain

Hi,
 
I understand your point, but the other option (not allowing texts without exercises) could lead to a misinterpretation of this website: if we only allow printables with exercises, we will be missing a lot of good ESL resources.
If the printable is not useful for the rest of teachers, they won �t download it, and the user will understand that he/she has to make something useful in order to get points.
If the text is really copied, we have more than one day to check it. Copied worksheets can always be reported.
 
Thank you for all your help,
 
Victor

9 Mar 2010     



Yulia Mo
Russian Federation

Dear Victor!
The problem is iа we don �t check the text the first day it will be lost forever and noone will ever check it unless the user is caught with another copy. It �s really hard.
And another hard thing is the lists. So many irregular verbs lists and countries lists every day. They cannot be the user �s creation, but we still need a link.
I �m just desperately trying to find a way to make the cleaning job easier.

9 Mar 2010     



Jayho
Australia

I wouldn�t worry too much Yulia.  I think that many of the older contributions will be picked up in due course as members search for useful information. When I scour the site for good printables I can �t believe how much stuff is clearly copied from the Internet (especially when it appears here multiple times).  If I have time to google for the link at that time, and, I find it then I will report it.
 
I have just tried the free online plagiarism checker recommended above by Darryl - and guess what - it works!  I just tried it on a section where I thought I saw copied stuff the other day and the checker worked like a dream in a matter of seconds (sorry to those of you who I caught out with this new toy [including the member with 10,000+ points] - but your now reported contributions do not appear to be your own work).  So, my students are going to be in for a BIG shock because Darryl just made my job so much easier (Thanks Darryl).
 
Cheers -- Jayho
 
 

9 Mar 2010     



lshorton99
China

I like the idea of the plagarism checker too! Every now and then I see a worksheet that I would swear is a copy but I can �t figure out where from so I don �t report it and just hope that someone else knows.

Jayho - your students are obviously better at copying than mine - it �s always obvious when mine do it! A classic was when my elementary students watched Dark Knight in class and one of them submitted a review of Batman Returns! I put it on the wall for the rest of the year - it was an excellent review!

9 Mar 2010     



Jayho
Australia

Ha ha Ishorton99 - that �s funny.  Actually, I sometimes get a word-perfect book review that is word for word from the internet and the student has even signed the declaration to say that it is their own work.
 
Mostly, if they copy, they copy chunks from different sites.  Ideally we have to find the link/s and this new toy will make it ever so quicker for me.

9 Mar 2010     



Yulia Mo
Russian Federation

Actually for me the Plagiarism checker didn �t work so well yesterday. Google made it better, so i will still rely on it when searching for copies as there you can see better the word hits, their order and analyze possible source of copy.

10 Mar 2010