Essay writing skills
Do this:
Read the following paragraph which highlights how poor essay writing skills can cause students to reference incorrectly.
“Students who lack confidence (or who have poor essay-writing skills) may find the expectations of proper referencing daunting when applied to their writing process. They experience a credibility gap, finding it hard to believe you expect them to acknowledge every source -- that would mean everything in their paper would be referenced. This attribute is premised on a profound lack of self-confidence and bewilderment as to how to develop their own ideas in an essay. Many of the students I spoke with were distressed when I pointed out that they had to acknowledge their sources. A common puzzled response is: "But then my entire essay would be all quotations or paraphrases! Nothing comes from me." These students are very frustrated because they know, on the one hand, they must do research, but on the other hand, they have been asked to develop a thesis and an argument. They are often capable of the former but terrified and bewildered at the prospects of doing the latter. I am convinced that many students, lacking the confidence and the skills to develop their own analysis or argument, deliberately retreat to plagiarism in the desperate and naïve belief that other people's ideas will be mistaken for their own argument.”
Think about this:
- Are you a student who is good at researching and describing other people’s ideas?
- Do you lack confidence about expressing your own ideas?
- How can you express your own ideas, and still acknowledge those of others?
For more help on this go to: Developing and expressing your own ideas.