The views of teacher candidates regarding the role of instructor in plagiarizing from Internet in their assignments

Abstract

In this study the role of instructor in teacher candidates’ act of plagiarism when doing assignments was investigated. This study was descriptive in nature and data were collected with a questionnaire. 237 teacher candidates studying at Anadolu University, Faculty of Education, Department of Primary Education during 2008-2009 spring semester participated in the study. Percentage, frequency and Chi-Square techniques were employed in the analysis of the data. The results of the study revealed that students primarily prefer Internet sources for their assignments and the number and type of assignments are found to be related to plagiarizing from Internet. While more than half of the teacher candidates thought that plagiarism from the Internet may result in repeating the course, nearly half of them stated that it would be appropriate to use homework, documents or sources from the Internet with modification in their own assignments. The tendency of teacher candidates concerning plagiarism from Internet was found out to be related to the variables originated from the instructor. The results obtained from the study suggest that students can be informed about developing ethics awareness and computer programs detecting plagiarism. Instructors should specify their expectations clearly in order to prevent plagiarism in assignments. Students may also be informed about the consequences of the plagiarism from Internet.