Writing Research Reports

If your elementary-aged students are ready to write a research report, here are two resources to help them.

Just the Facts walks students through a basic overview of each of the tools they will use in their report, from starting with a topic to making a bibliography.

Don't Be a Copycat!  is intended for the older elementary crowd, its content going deeper, including more detailed information about plagiarizing, assessing sources, taking notes, and citing sources. As the title indicates, the goal is to teach students how to avoid plagiarism.

Writing a research report need not be daunting. With their step-by-step instructions and conversational tone, both of these books will ground your children for the challenge before them.

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Avoiding Plagiarism

 

How do you teach your students about plagiarism and how to avoid it?

A friend sent me this article written by Mrs. Richman, a leader in homeschooling and a current teacher.

After teaching in both a private Christian school and a co-op myself, I can tell you that plagiarism cannot be overlooked.  It is a serious problem which deserves its time in the homeschool setting. We need to start by explaining to our kids what it is; Mrs. Richman does a fabulous job of showing it with excellent (and unfortunate) examples. Perhaps the discussion can begin by reading the article together. Then we need to teach strong research skills or put our kids in settings where they will learn them.

Should we wait until high school to introduce the word?  Absolutely not. As soon as students are drawing ideas from other sources, they need to know it's not okay to borrow (i.e. steal) someone else's words. Their note-taking and citations may not be as sophisticated as an older kid's, but if they learn young, they'll avoid a whole lot of trouble later. More importantly, they'll have work that is truly their own.

See Writing Research Reports for additional help.