# Stupid Cheater Tricks **URL:** \ **Category:** The BBQ Pit\ **Created:** [January 27, 2005, 6:20am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/stupid-cheater-tricks/286886 "2005-01-27T06:20:16Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 9
**Author:** ![Balle\_M](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/13edae/32.png) [@Balle\_M](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Balle_M)\ **Post date:** [April 5, 2005, 3:21am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/stupid-cheater-tricks/286886/161 "2005-04-05T03:21:27Z")
> [@altiod](#): > > My personal favorite story was from when I taught Art Appreciation at a Catholic girls high school. Hmm…I think I have this video. Isn’t it the one with Traci Lords? My cheat story… After the meeting of our local Civil War Roundtable our guest speaker and I were discussing the subject over an adult libation. Joe College takes the stool next to me and listens to the conversation. “You know a lot about the Civil War?” he asks. “A bit. It’s a hobby of mine.” “I need to write a paper on it.” “Should be easy, there’s lots of material there.” To make a long story short, he asked me to write a paper on the fall of Atlanta in exchange for a collection of past Presidents issued by the U.S. mint. I pointed to our guest speaker and said, “That’s the man you want to talk to. He’d do a much better job. He’s a history professor - in fact, he’s probably _your_ professor.” He was. The prof addressed him by name and Joe turned whiter than a Republican trying to dance. It was a thing of beauty. ---
**Author:** ![Fretful\_Porpentine](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/fretful_porpentine/32/2873_2.png) [@Fretful\_Porpentine](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Fretful_Porpentine)\ **Post date:** [April 5, 2005, 3:49pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/stupid-cheater-tricks/286886/162 "2005-04-05T15:49:18Z")
> [@capybara](#): > > I don’t even think [turnitin.com](http://turnitin.com) and such are necessary-- usually the shift in tone is so striking that you can just pop in the first 5 words of a particularly good sentence and find the site they copied it from (I think in this day and age the people who procrastinate to the extent that they have to plagiarize won’t bother copying text from a book but will simply hunt it down in the web, and if you have 80 students writing on 3 topics, a number of them will manage to find the same site and things start sounding familiar). Indeed. I’m amazed by the number of students who seem to be just plain deaf to shifts in writing style and tone. > [@](#): > > When I get a real job I intend to have students work through their term papers in a very pedantic manner-- I’ll ask for a topic 2d week, a prospectus for the argument, a bibliography 4th week, an annotated bib in week 6, then an outline, etc. Not only will this force everyone to think through their own work (or do an impressive amount of backengineering from a purchased essay?) but it will also make lazy but competent scholars (like myself as an undergrad) have to go through a careful research project as it SHOULD be done (and, if they end up in grad school, as it will HAVE to be done) rather than writing a paper below their abilities the day before it’s due. Is this naive of me? I wouldn’t say it’s naive of you, but I think your timetable is a bit off – I don’t believe it’s fair to ask students to commit themselves to a topic in the _second week_ of class, before they’ve actually _read_ the vast majority of the course material or had more than a brief overview of the issues the course is going to cover. You have to know something about the subject to choose an appropriate topic for a research paper. I have certainly never chosen a topic for the final paper in the first two weeks of any of my grad school classes – ideas usually emerged out of the readings we were doing for the course, and I don’t think I’ve ever started work on the actual paper until midterm-time or even later. I like the general concept of your assignment sequence, but I think it would work better if you condensed it into the second half of the course rather than spread it out over the entire semester. ---
**Author:** ![Digital\_Stimulus](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/aeb1de/32.png) [@Digital\_Stimulus](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Digital_Stimulus)\ **Post date:** [April 5, 2005, 4:09pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/stupid-cheater-tricks/286886/163 "2005-04-05T16:09:18Z")
> [@Fretful Porpentine](#): > > I wouldn’t say it’s naive of you, but I think your timetable is a bit off – I don’t believe it’s fair to ask students to commit themselves to a topic in the _second week_ of class, before they’ve actually _read_ the vast majority of the course material or had more than a brief overview of the issues the course is going to cover. You have to know something about the subject to choose an appropriate topic for a research paper. I have certainly never chosen a topic for the final paper in the first two weeks of any of my grad school classes – ideas usually emerged out of the readings we were doing for the course, and I don’t think I’ve ever started work on the actual paper until midterm-time or even later. I like the general concept of your assignment sequence, but I think it would work better if you condensed it into the second half of the course rather than spread it out over the entire semester. Yeah, that bugged me a little. Your proposal sounds about right. Perhaps assign some general papers in the first week or two (even just skimming them), ask for a (very general) idea and follow-up reading list in the following weeks, then require a topic, outline, etc. after the midterm. The problem is that most undergrad classes are structured to expand base knowledge as the class progresses. As an undergrad, I found my ignorance to be crippling when asked to come up with a paper topic on my own. How could I be expected to propose a specific (worthy) topic when I was taking the class with little or no knowledge of the field in the first place? Naturally, open lines of communication between professor/student are essential – provide a not-so-invisible hand as guidance. ---
**Author:** ![PoorYorick](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/p/ecccb3/32.png) [@PoorYorick](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/PoorYorick)\ **Post date:** [April 5, 2005, 5:29pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/stupid-cheater-tricks/286886/164 "2005-04-05T17:29:43Z")
> [@capybara](#): > > When I get a real job I intend to have students work through their term papers in a very pedantic manner-- I’ll ask for a topic 2d week, a prospectus for the argument, a bibliography 4th week, an annotated bib in week 6, then an outline, etc. This is what I had to do in an ethnology class. It was _very_ helpful. I was one of those competent but lazy students, and was amazed at how good a paper I could write. I’m still lazy, though. As far as stupid cheaters go, I guess I have a tendency to take it personally sometimes, as if the cheater is saying, “I think you’re a dumb ass, so I’m not even going to try hard.” Such as when I got two take-home tests back that were in the same handwriting. The guy didn’t even take the effort to copy from his girlfriend who was in the same class. Instead, she just wrote out both exams. She’s like the woman I saw in an AA meeting getting the court-mandated attendance sheet signed for her husband who couldn’t bother attending. ---
**Author:** ![Roland\_Orzabal](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/c2a13f/32.png) [@Roland\_Orzabal](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Roland_Orzabal)\ **Post date:** [April 5, 2005, 7:28pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/stupid-cheater-tricks/286886/165 "2005-04-05T19:28:57Z")
> [@capybara](#): > > When I get a real job I intend to have students work through their term papers in a very pedantic manner-- I’ll ask for a topic 2d week, a prospectus for the argument, a bibliography 4th week, an annotated bib in week 6, then an outline, etc. Not only will this force everyone to think through their own work (or do an impressive amount of backengineering from a purchased essay?) but it will also make lazy but competent scholars (like myself as an undergrad) have to go through a careful research project as it SHOULD be done (and, if they end up in grad school, as it will HAVE to be done) rather than writing a paper below their abilities the day before it’s due. [slight hijack] This is a perfectly good method of ensuring that students use the proper methods of research and style. I, however, hate this kind of thing, as I know how to write a decent research paper, and have a strong distaste for being forced to do what I would do on my own anyway. Call it a personal quirk. I can tell you with 100% surity what I would do were I to find myself in your class. I would spend the first two weeks busting my ass to peruse the material to decide on a viable topic, compile copious research, formulate a basic outline, and write the damned paper. I would then, as you put it, reverse-engineer the entire thing to turn in the individual parts as you require them. This would not be done to “get one over on you”, as I would still be accomplishing what you wished for me to accomplish, if anything with _more_ effort on my part than would be necessary. I would still do it, though, just because I despise having my hand forced. I would wager a substantial amount that my best friend, a Dean’s List-ed junior at Virginia Tech, would do the same. Just my own two cents there, to let you know what this system may potentially inspire. How common this attitude is, I couldn’t begin to guess, but you ought to know that it exists. [/slight hijack] ---
**Author:** ![amarinth](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/3be4f8/32.png) [@amarinth](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/amarinth)\ **Post date:** [April 5, 2005, 7:39pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/stupid-cheater-tricks/286886/166 "2005-04-05T19:39:29Z")
> [@capybara](#): > > If part of what I’m trying to teach them is proper writing method and research? Hmm. Maybe? I really don’t think they get that in high school-- they don’t just show up at college with research paper skills (really) and the ‘effective writing’ courses seem to mostly teach them the grammar you wish they already knew, and essay format, but not deep research writing. We have things like intermittent quizzes and midterms and such-- why shouldn’t the research portion of the grade be meted out over the term as well? It’s just another set of due dates-- would it help if it was all phrased as separate assignments? I mean, is asking for an annotated bibliography on a topic really all that outlandish and draconian? No, it isn’t draconian. And I certainly see the value of teaching the students the proper way to write a research paper. (That research papers should include pre-planning and intermediate steps that should take some time. That they’re not merely mad dashes to the library or web searches done two days before the paper is due) ---
**Author:** ![MandaJo](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/ac91a4/32.png) [@MandaJo](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/MandaJo)\ **Post date:** [April 6, 2005, 2:52am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/stupid-cheater-tricks/286886/167 "2005-04-06T02:52:11Z")
In high-school, I do the research-paper-in-stages thing myself, and it works really well–however, I have a different approach. I have them write whole chunks of the paper through out the year–I don’t care how they outline or take notes of whatever, because everyone has their own method, and I think forcing the means–rather than the outcome–leads to resentment from the brightest kids. It works like this: I teach an American literature survey. At the beginning of the year, they pick a broad topic–women, or nature, or sex, or, or race, or religion, or whatever–to research. For each literary period we study–Puritanism, Rationalism, Romanticism, Realism/Naturalism, and Modernism–they write a 2-3 page paper that sums up the period in general and what the secondary sources have to say about their broad topic in that time period, and ending with their own analysis of the way their topic is portrayed in a primary source from the period–usually in the novel we read for class. Each mini-paper has a bibliography. I labouriously line-edit each mini-paper, noting mistakes and making suggestions. Then, in the spring, they copy-and-paste them all into one document, write an introduction–with a comprehensive thesis–and a conclusion, and integrate thier bibliographies. It works very well because we aren’t mastering any one skill and then building on it, but repeating the same skill set over and over. The idea of establishing a solid foundation to build on has an aesthetic appeal, but it doesn’t work, because minds don’t work like buildings. Nothing is ever really mastered: if you try to master one skill and then move on, you always forget whatever you think you mastered. Instead, students need to be taught all the skills they need more or less at once, then you let them do badly, correct them, let them do it all again, correct again, repeat as needed. It’s in the repeition that they learn, and conventional research paper models don’t really allow for repetion-with-feedback, because once the big paper is over, you’re done. If you were teaching someone to cook a feast, you wouldn’t have them make a menu one week, prepare a grocery list the next week, shop the third week, set up the kitchen the fourth week, cook everything the fifth week, and serve the food on the sixth week. You’d have them plan, shop, set-up, cook, and serve each individual dish each week, and then have them cook everything together for the final meal. ---
**Author:** ![Chairman\_Pow](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/838e76/32.png) [@Chairman\_Pow](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Chairman_Pow)\ **Post date:** [April 6, 2005, 3:24am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/stupid-cheater-tricks/286886/168 "2005-04-06T03:24:56Z")
> [@Roland Orzabal](#): > > [slight hijack] > I would spend the first two weeks busting my ass to peruse the material to decide on a viable topic, compile copious research, formulate a basic outline, and write the damned paper. I would then, as you put it, reverse-engineer the entire thing to turn in the individual parts as you require them. And then you’ll write your honors thesis your senior year and do what college students the world over do: limp along and then rush to the finished project. Which may or may not be good and may or may not get you an invitation to apply for a Rhodes Scholarship. I still hate those people. ---
**Author:** ![Roland\_Orzabal](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/c2a13f/32.png) [@Roland\_Orzabal](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Roland_Orzabal)\ **Post date:** [April 6, 2005, 4:38am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/stupid-cheater-tricks/286886/169 "2005-04-06T04:38:16Z")
> [@Chairman Pow](#): > > And then you’ll write your honors thesis your senior year and do what college students the world over do: limp along and then rush to the finished project. Which may or may not be good and may or may not get you an invitation to apply for a Rhodes Scholarship. > > I still hate those people. Pardon, but…come again? ---
**Author:** ![Chairman\_Pow](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/838e76/32.png) [@Chairman\_Pow](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Chairman_Pow)\ **Post date:** [April 6, 2005, 10:37pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/stupid-cheater-tricks/286886/170 "2005-04-06T22:37:38Z")
> [@Roland Orzabal](#): > > Pardon, but…come again? You’ll realize that all your hard work is a waste of time. Fun, but a waste of time. The time you spent doing all that could be put to other uses - Xbox, girls, beer, beer. ---
**Author:** ![Monstre](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/e274bd/32.png) [@Monstre](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Monstre)\ **Post date:** [April 6, 2005, 10:53pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/stupid-cheater-tricks/286886/171 "2005-04-06T22:53:50Z")
BTW, if there are any other computer programming teachers or TAs following this thread… This term I found and started using a very nice tool that helps spot cases of code-copying. Its a free service and performs a syntax-tree level comparison of the code. So tricks like variable name changes, formatting changes, addition/deletion of comments do not fool the software. Results are reported in a very easy-to-read form, including a nice split-screen side-by-side view of source code, so you can verify by hand. Activate with a Perl script, with a few command line options, and it takes just a few seconds to run a whole batch of submissions through, and just a minute or two to identify the likely problem cases – i.e. which ones I need to review by hand. To programming teachers – if this sounds like a tool you could use, drop me a line, and I’ll send you the info. ---
**Author:** ![Dangerosa](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/22d042/32.png) [@Dangerosa](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Dangerosa)\ **Post date:** [April 6, 2005, 10:56pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/stupid-cheater-tricks/286886/172 "2005-04-06T22:56:09Z")
capybara - I’m kind of with Roland. Unless you are teaching composition. Its patronizing to assume I don’t know how to do one. I wrote my first research paper in fifth grade (five pages on whales), was taught again every year until I graduated high school. Was taught how to do it in Freshman Comp and again in my upper division writing course. I doubt students aren’t being taught – I think they are choosing not to learn and I shouldn’t be patronized because they haven’t bothered. ---
**Author:** ![Eureka](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/74df32/32.png) [@Eureka](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Eureka)\ **Post date:** [April 7, 2005, 12:58am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/stupid-cheater-tricks/286886/173 "2005-04-07T00:58:02Z")
On the other hand, I’m taking a graduate level course in which we are being asked to turn in intermediate steps for a final project so that we get feedback along the way. The project in question is an application for a research grant as opposed to a more traditional research paper. this does mean that many of us don’t know what format the thing is supposed to take. But, despite assurances by the professor that the intermediate steps will be grade only S/U with the opportunity to redo any Us, some people are still getting entierly too stressed out over the intermediate steps. I don’t think that the professor is concerned so much about plaigerism as she is that we understand the steps involved, and by making people turn in intermediate steps she is helping to ensure that the final projects she receives are up to her standards. You can’t please everyone. And it may be patronizing, but I’ve sure heard a lot of comments in the past ten years that suggest that college freshmen today are not nearly as prepared to write papers as the college freshmen of ten or twenty years ago. Figuring out the balancing line between students who just don’t care about doing the work, students who don’t mind “meaningful” work but hate “busy work” , students who have written many decent papers and students who’ve never been required to write a quality paper could be a job in itself. ---
**Author:** ![vivalostwages](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/v/d07c76/32.png) [@vivalostwages](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/vivalostwages)\ **Post date:** [April 7, 2005, 2:39am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/stupid-cheater-tricks/286886/174 "2005-04-07T02:39:43Z")
It’s true: We get an awful lot of students now who don’t have a clue as to how to write a paper. Some do, of course, but the others have a very tough time of it, especially if they are trying to rush through college despite their lack of preparation. Or maybe I notice it more because I seem to get quite a few international students who struggle with English and even wind up having to drop Freshman Comp. because they came into it before they were ready. RE: research, some have done it before and some haven’t. Some have done APA but don’t know MLA. Some have done one or two citations but were never asked to find any more than a few sources before. If a few want to zip ahead and get their papers done early, that’s okay with me. They will pick up helpful handouts during the library orientation mentioned below, but some will go and get those handouts ahead of time. No problem. The way I do the research paper is to build up to it. After the students have gotten through the paragraph and essay assignments, they start working on the research paper. We brainstorm topics, get an overview, visit the library for an orientation, cover the relevant chapters in the textbook, and then I have a number of days arranged when they can sit down with me and have conferences on their thesis and outline, draft(s) and works cited page, peer edit someone else’s paper and have theirs edited as well, then turn in the final draft. Some will need more time than others, which is why I block out extra time for this towards the end of the semester. ---
**Author:** ![matt\_mcl](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/7ab992/32.png) [@matt\_mcl](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/matt_mcl)\ **Post date:** [April 7, 2005, 4:22am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/stupid-cheater-tricks/286886/175 "2005-04-07T04:22:09Z")
> [@Clothahump](#): > > Sweet Young Thing comes in to discuss progress in class with Steve. Steve points out deficiencies and makes some suggestions. SWT hems and haws about having to do work, then puts a move on Steve and offers to “trade for a grade”. Steve declines. … LOL, the same thing happened to my favourite English teacher from cegep, Mr. Peters. As in Mr. “I’m so gay I can’t even sit on the furniture, let’s deconstruct the music video for ‘Express Yourself!’” Peters. He was like, "Honey, you haven’t been paying any attention at _all, have_ you?! And as for the bluebook thing, if I had been required to bring my own bluebooks, I would have done even worse than I did in university because I can barely remember _that_ we have an exam on such and such a date, let alone remember to go and buy something for it and bring it with me. ---
**Author:** ![matt\_mcl](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/7ab992/32.png) [@matt\_mcl](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/matt_mcl)\ **Post date:** [April 7, 2005, 4:30am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/stupid-cheater-tricks/286886/176 "2005-04-07T04:30:56Z")
And let me say I would have been absolutely verklempt if I had been asked to decide on a paper topic in the first few weeks of class. I just handed in a fifteen-page paper on Catalan translation, on whose topic I did not decide until early March and then, only with the assistance of a teacher in a different but related department next to whom I happened to sit on the train ride back from Toronto. So yeah, it was a great paper I enjoyed a lot, but that I was sweating about the whole beginning of the semester, and I never would have come up with that topic in January. ---
**Author:** ![dropzone](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/dropzone/32/7515_2.png) [@dropzone](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/dropzone)\ **Post date:** [April 7, 2005, 4:39am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/stupid-cheater-tricks/286886/177 "2005-04-07T04:39:11Z")
> [@Dangerosa](#): > > I wrote my first research paper in fifth grade (five pages on whales), was taught again every year until I graduated high school. Ah, like me and multiple choice tests. The company that first developed the readers (“Take out your Number Two Pencil…”) was down the road so I had them from first grade on when most other chumps my age were still sniffing mimeograph sheets. (Have you ever done that high? Different story.) I can’t trust IQ tests because I’ve been taking multi-choice tests so long I can do well on one in my sleep. Another vote against demanding too much about papers too early in the semester. ---
**Author:** ![matt\_mcl](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/7ab992/32.png) [@matt\_mcl](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/matt_mcl)\ **Post date:** [April 7, 2005, 6:08am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/stupid-cheater-tricks/286886/178 "2005-04-07T06:08:36Z")
> [@Dangerosa](#): > > Its patronizing to assume I don’t know how to do one. I wrote my first research paper in fifth grade (five pages on whales), was taught again every year until I graduated high school. Was taught how to do it in Freshman Comp and again in my upper division writing course. During my translation certificate, it seemed like every semester we had one or another class that dealt with the basics of grammar and composition (“this is how you use commas… this is a dangling modifier…”) By the third semester, I was ready to lodge my _Little, Brown_ up someone’s nose. ---
**Author:** ![Monstre](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/e274bd/32.png) [@Monstre](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Monstre)\ **Post date:** [April 7, 2005, 6:20am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/stupid-cheater-tricks/286886/179 "2005-04-07T06:20:15Z")
> [@vivalostwages](#): > > The way I do the research paper is to build up to it. After the students have gotten through the paragraph and essay assignments, they start working on the research paper. Same here for programming assignments – the easy short ones at the start of the term, and then they get more involved and longer towards the end of the term. Inevitably leading to the few students who come forth with the same whine, “But the programs at the end of the term were **harder** than the ones earlier on!!!” Well, DUH… You’re supposed to know more by the end of the term… ---
**Author:** ![Gary\_Robson](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/gary_robson/32/3448_2.png) [@Gary\_Robson](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Gary_Robson)\ **Post date:** [April 7, 2005, 4:37pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/stupid-cheater-tricks/286886/180 "2005-04-07T16:37:44Z")
> [@capybara](#): > > When I get a real job I intend to have students work through their term papers in a very pedantic manner-- I’ll ask for a topic 2d week, a prospectus for the argument, a bibliography 4th week, an annotated bib in week 6, then an outline, etc. … Is this naive of me? You are talking about forcing a method that just doesn’t match up with real life. I’m a writer, so I do this kind of thing for a living. I can’t give you a full bibliography before the outline is done. I don’t even _find_ some of my reference materials until I’m far into the research phase. The bibliography is an ongoing list of what I discover as I work. I’ll be reading one book or paper that references another that references another, and so on. Sometimes it can take weeks to get my hands on some of this stuff. Similarly, the outline is a living document. I don’t wait until week 6 to prepare an outline. That’s the first thing I put together. Then, as I work, it gets rearranged, expanded, and sometimes has items removed that don’t fit. With one book I wrote last year, I had over 2/3 of the text written and found some new reference materials. I ended up splitting up one chapter into three, dropping one whole section because it made the book too long, and moving one of the later chapters up front to provide background material. If you force a student to follow an outline and bibliography that was written before the research was completed, you’ll be getting a sub-par paper. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/stupid-cheater-tricks/286886.md?page=8) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/stupid-cheater-tricks/286886.md?page=10)