Formats Essay! Woot!

The difference between a scholarly journal article and a website is dependant upon many factors. For one a website could have been written by anyone whereas a scholarly journal article was more than likely written by a credible source. However, scholarly journal articles can also be published online, therefore considered the content of a website. The two can go hand in hand or they can be complete opposites. On another note, a scholarly journal article usually brings to mind academic study and they usually have references and cite where the collection of data came from whereas a website can be anything such as Myspace or Twitter which do not cite anything. Just like in the advanced formats presentation, one should explore to see if the website is a credible resource. From my experiences, I have noticed that the websites I frequent are far from being scholarly and never cite anything, however, I have also crossed paths with web based scholarly sites primarily for school purposes such as research papers. Perhaps the biggest difference between the two are the connotations linked with either and the biased classification representing both.

Topic Development Exercise

Part I

What happened in the Darfur region of Western Sudan this past year?

Weak question because it is too broad. A lot can happen in a year. I would suggest asking about the three major events of the past year, or asking specifically about particular event.

Did news coverage of the poor conditions at the U.S. Military’s Walter Reed Medical Center result in improved care of the veterans housed there?

Good Question, specific enough to evoke an accuracy, and broad enough for the answer to be interesting.

Did Germany invade Poland during the Second World War?

Weak question, though straight to the point, it leads to a yes or no answer. I would add on to the question, keeping it as is and then adding "to what cause"?

Does the media cause eating disorders in women?

Broad question, though not a bad one. It too is answerable with yes or no, therefore I would insist on changing it to "which genre of media causes more women to develop eating disorders"?

Is there evidence that vocational training programs in California prisons impact recidivism (re-offense) rates?

Good question, but it would be beneficial to ask also where the evidence comes from as well as its accuracy so as to avoid yes or no answers.

Part II

In order to prepare myself to speak about a topic for one minute I would do some research naturally. But first I would be sure to choose a topic that I am comfortable and interested in enough to do the research and of course talk about. Indeed it would be a process of selection, choosing the sub topics that would make the overall topic come together. Then of course I would apply the knowledge that I have with the knowledge that I have gained adding an improvised analysis during the one minute exactly at the point where I have that a-ha feeling.

Some ways to narrow the focus of a research topic is to discard the topics that are not of the most importance or relevance. Another idea is to talk about the topics and hear what doesn't flow. Tactical topic cuts are the best way however, by using the Goldilocks method and finding the Just Right topics, sub-topics, and information, one can easily cut out the filler. In many cases, less is more.

Plagiarism & Citation Assignment

Plagiarism & Citation Assignment

Directions: Post all answers to the questions below to your personal blog by the stated due date.

Part 1

Put yourself in your professor's shoes. Sometimes students hand in work that just doesn't look like student writing! Your job for the next three questions is to find out whether all or part of these examples were cut and pasted from a website. If so, paste the url of the website that was plagiarized below the writing sample. If not, just write "not plagiarized."

Note: you can google an exact phrase by putting it in " " (quotation marks) in the search box.

1. Student writes:

"Athough electronic health records can save health professionals time and cut hospital costs, implementing these systems will be a challenge. Many hospitals cannot afford them, and physician resistance and the lack of universal standards are also reasons cited by hospitals for not instituting these systems. President Obama’s economic stimulus package, which includes 19 billion for e-health records, might be enough to overcome the barriers to adopting these technologies”

Maybe I'm not searching right but, not plagiarized.

2. Student writes:

"The controversial issue of global warming has troubled society for many years now. Although some believe that it is a hoax, others view global warming as the greatest challenge of our time. While global warming is a complex issue that some have used to manipulate consumers, it must be taken seriously as the bulk of scientific evidence points to the reality of this phenomenon, which can dramatically alter our climate.”

Not Plagiarized

3. Student writes:

“Twitter, a so-called micro-blogging service has taken off over the past year. Users may post messages about their status, their moods, their location and other tidbits on Twitter. Most popular among young adults, Twitter has also been used by savvy marketers to inform users about products, and even by journalists who use it as a quick method of sharing story coverage.”

Not Plagiarized.

Part 2

Use the APA Citation Guidelines to put all the elements of the scrambled citations in the right place and make correct APA style citations.

4. Avoiding plagiarism. Retrieved January 13, 2008, from Academic Search Premier database. 28(3), 439-446. Burkill, S., & Abbey, C. Journal of Geography in Higher Education. (2004).

What kind of citation is this?

Article

Burkill, S., Abbey, C. (2004). Avoiding Plagiarism. Journal of Geography in Higher Education. 28(3), 439-446. Retrieved January 13, 2008, from Academic Search Premier database.

5. (2006). My stroke of insight: A Brain scientist’s personal journey. Taylor, J.B.

New York: Viking.

What kind of citation is this?

Book

Taylor, J.B. (2006). My stroke of insight: A Brian scientist's personal journey. New York: Viking

6. Retrieved March 27, 2009 from http://auto.howstuffworks.com/ngv.htm How

natural-gas vehicles work. (n.d.). Harris, W.

What kind of citation is this?

Website

Harris, W. (N.D). How natural-gas vehicles work. Retrieved March 27, 2009 from http://auto.howstuffworks.com/ngv.htm

7. Logan, UT: College Reading Association. (pp. 51-54). In M.B. Sampson, P.E. Linder, F. Falk-Ross, M. Foote, & S. Szabo (Eds.), (2007). Stroud, B. Multiple Literacies in the 21^st Century Writing about African Americans, their communities, and their quilts.

What kind of citation is this?

Book Article/Chapter

Stroud, B. (2007). Multiple Literacies in the 21st Century Writing about African American, their communities, and their quilts. In Sampson, M.B., Linder, P.E., Falk-Ross, F., Foote, M., Szabo, S. (Eds). (pp.51-54). Logan, UT: College Reading Association.

Part 3

Read the paragraphs below. Bold or italicize the sentences that are NOT common knowledge and therefore need a citation. Insert the in-text citation using the information you’ll find in the reference list entry for each paragraph.

8. Global warming is the increase in the Earth’s temperature as the result of greenhouse gases trapped in the atmosphere. Zakaria (2007) claims that because of global warming, the average temperature of the Earth could rise as much as 8 degrees, causing sea levels to rise up to 23 inches over this century. I believe that we all have a responsibility to help prevent global warming. A recent report suggests that just by using more efficient appliances, we can have a significant impact on carbon emissions that affect global warming.

Zakaria, F. (2007, February 19). Global warming: Get used to it. Newsweek, 149(8), 43. Retrieved December 20, 2007, from Academic Search Premier database.

9. It’s no secret that the American population is getting fatter, in spite of our cultural obsession with fitness. Public health officials have expressed concern that the obesity “epidemic” is striking Americans of all ages, from very young children to older adults, and are looking to community groups to conduct outreach with at-risk groups. Through such efforts we can only hope for a healthier future.

Turner, T. (2007). Organizations present options to fight obesity. New York Amsterdam News, 98(52), 27-36. Retrieved December 20, 2007, from Academic Search Premier database.

10. Cancer is certainly a terrible disease, and researchers are hard at work attempting to find treatments and cures. However, it can be difficult for patients to figure out what is a legitimate treatment and what is the modern-day equivalent of snake oil, and it can be a source of stress to already burdened patients figuring out what is real medicine. The Academic Search Premier database (2007) points out that lowering the levels of copper in the body, eating a specialized organic, vegetarian, macrobiotic diet, and an Irish light therapy are just the kinds of experimental treatments that may have patients and their families scratching their heads.

Tomorrow’s cancer cures. Prevention, 55(3), 60. Retrieved December 20, 2007, from Academic Search Premier database.

Part 4

Practice paraphrasing the following passages. Remember, it is not enough to rearrange the sentence a little and change a few words here and there. Starting from scratch, restate the idea with a completely different sentence structure and completely different words. Don’t forget your citation!

11. To ensure that the students use high-quality information when writing a term paper, professors might require students to find credentials for the authors of Web sites they cite. Figuring out who authored Web content, their backgrounds, motivations, or points of view may constitute a good lesson in critical thinking in itself. Teaching students how to critique the quality of Web sites and evaluate the quality and accuracy of information will help them in their post-academic futures.

Embleton, K., & Helfer, D. S. (2007, June). The plague of plagiarism and academic dishonesty. Searcher 15(6), 23-26.

Embleton and Helfer (2007) suggest that students who evaluate their rescources will not only create great term papers, but will also improve their post-academic futures.

12. Scientists have been searching for the cause of Alzheimer's disease for more than 100 years, and during that time, theories about why brain cells are destroyed in the course of the illness have come and gone. One of the newer and more unorthodox theories posits that Alzheimer's may actually be a form of diabetes. Some experts have even taken to calling the brain disease type 3 diabetes, as distinct from the insulin-dependent (type 1) and adult-onset (type 2) varieties of the condition.

Arnst, C. (2007, December 17). Is Alzheimer’s a form of diabetes? Business Week 4063, 54-55. Retrieved January 14, 2008, from Academic Search Premier database.

Arnst (2007) presents how some scientist believe Alzheimers to be directly linked to diebetes.

13. According to Leaving Women Behind: Modern Families, Outdated Laws, the regulations that govern private pensions did not contemplate the influx of women into the labor market and therefore are not suited to the way modern women live. "Because women live longer than men, they are more likely to suffer the defects of our retirement systems," asserts co-author Kim Strassel. "Because the laws governing private pensions weren't designed for the modern woman, many have little retirement security. If reforms are not made soon, a growing number of women will be denied their 'golden years.'"

Outdated laws hurt women. (2006, August). USA Today Magazine, 135(2735), 9-10. Retrieved January 14, 2008, from Academic Search Premier database.

According to USA Today Magazine (2006) women are not covered for retirement pensions and because women live longer than men, the influx will be devastating for those reaching their 'golden years'.