Teaching Students to Respect Intellectual Property

Video Transcription

Hi everyone and welcome to today's lesson. I hope you're all doing well. The topic is teaching students to respect intellectual property. My name is Gino Sangiuliano, and let's get started.

Let's begin by going over some of the teacher responsibilities that are somewhat unique as we do our job in the 21st century. Teachers need to practice and model components of the ISTE standards in their planning, instruction, and even their assessments. ISTE stands for are the International Society for Technology in Education.

With digital resources literally in the palm of our hands, teachers need to continue to emphasize the importance of how to use them safely. With so much information available, it's also important for students to be able to wade through it all and find what's most appropriate for their assigned task. And finally, students need to avoid plagiarism. Not only does it show a disregard for intellectual property, they most likely will get caught and be subject to serious consequences. This is the main topic of today's lesson.

I wanted to come up with an example of plagiarism. The problem wasn't finding only one, the problem was finding too many. I decided to share three unique stories having to do with taking and using someone else's intellectual property without permission.

The first one comes from the world of music. Over the years, there have been many lawsuits and allegations in the music industry. The most recent being the family of Marvin Gaye accusing Pharrell Williams and Robin Thicke of taking elements of Gaye's "Got to Give it Up" for their hit single "Blurred Lines."

A case closer to home involved a superintendent of schools giving a speech at a high school graduation ceremony. The only problem was that the speech was almost identical to that given by a navy admiral at a university a month earlier. The superintendent was forced to step down. And finally, a news editor with CNN was recently fired after it was discovered that she had published nearly 50 stories containing 128 separate occurrences of plagiarism. If you want to read more about the cases, the links to the articles are provided below.

Although it's more difficult to impress on younger children, we do need to make them aware of what intellectual property is in order for them to grasp the concept of plagiarism. Intellectual property is a product of the intellect such as an expressed idea our concept that has commercial value. The expression of the original ideas is considered intellectual property. Intellectual property is protected by copyright laws, just like inventions are. And finally, almost all forms of expression fall under copyright protection, as long as they're recorded in some way.

Now that we know what intellectual property is, it'll be easier to understand plagiarism. Plagiarism means to steal and pass off the ideas or words of others as one's own. It also means to use another's production without crediting the source. It means to commit literary theft, and to present as new and original an idea or product derived from an existing source.

Here is a list of examples of plagiarism that educators may come across with regards to their students' work. Taking credit for work written by someone else. Using a quotation without inserting quotation marks. Incorrectly citing the source of information. Rewriting someone else's ideas without giving credit to the original source. Using a source to comprise most of your work, regardless of citing or even giving credit.

Teaching students about intellectual property is the first step to helping them avoid plagiarism. Here are a few other things we can do. We can always encourage students to ask the teacher if they're not sure. We'll want students to plan their work carefully, and have a balance between ideas from sources and original ideas. When in doubt, we want students to cite their sources. We also want them to know how to paraphrase and summarize. And finally, if students carefully analyze and evaluate their sources, they're less likely of being accused of plagiarism.

Let's go ahead and summarize what we covered in today's lesson. We began by looking at teacher responsibilities and how they've changed to match the 21st century classrooms. We defined the term "intellectual property," and also defined the term "plagiarism." We looked at different samples of plagiarism, specifically some that you would see in schools. And we gave some tips to teachers for how they could help their students avoid plagiarism.

And now for today's food for thought. Conduct an online search of examples of plagiarism. Notice the many different ways plagiarism occurs. As you reflect on how this new information can be applied, you may want to explore the additional resources section that accompanies this video presentation. This is where you'll find links to resources chosen to help you deepen your learning and explore ways to apply your newly acquired skill set.

Thanks for watching, and we'll see you next time.