Getting Started with iPads for Teaching

iOS Devices for Learning

I've been working with iPads in schools since they first burst onto the pedagogical scene all the way back in 2010. Needless to say a lot has changed since then, and while where I work has scaled up from 50 to more like 500 now, and with it a fancy wireless management system, I'm conscious that many, if not most schools our there are still working out the basics, if that's the case, then this post is for you... 

There are several critical steps to get right, but one thing to be considered right at the start is how you plan to to store the iPads… The solution that we have opted for is to purchase an iPad cart for each class set, most iPad carts contain anywhere between 24 and 48 iPads. The reason why this is important is that you will need a way to be able to simultaneously keep the iPads safe, secure, synchronised with a master computer, and synchronise charging of all the devices.

The only problem is that the price of these carts can tend towards the absolutely ridiculous (try US$4000 for one Bedford cart) we are currently getting some iPad cards manufactured in Singapore for 500 Singapore dollars per cart which aren't as fancy as the ones I mentioned, but do the job.

So here's the critical elements in a nutshell: 

• iPad storage 
• App purchasing and updating on a 'mother computer'
• creation of a master iPad 
• Careful consideration of settings (and restrictions) on the Master iPad
• cloning (imaging) of the master iPad onto each of the other iPads (using iTunes and the 'mother' computer)
• a system for keeping the iPads charged that does not make the mistake of "cooking" them.

The creation of a Master iPad is critical to get right, as once you have cloned it onto 20—200 other iPads (this could easily take at least half an hour to one hour per iPad) you don't want to have to do that again too soon. Once a year would be an ideal goal although it is common to have to reclone all the iPads two or three times a year (to update Apps, and add Apps that are 'essential')… 

Now I can obviously help you with establishing a decent master iPad, to that end, here is a link to a photo gallery of screenshots that show clearly how a master iPad is organised.

Master iPad Considerations 

Some important rules of thumb to consider when creating the master iPad are:

• Consider very carefully what the folders are that you will use to organise the Apps 
• Give folders short, simple, but meaningful names, 
• Consider very carefully how many content apps you choose to include (if any) as without any doubt the most powerful use of the iPad is not content/consumption apps but creation Apps—Apps that require students to work from a blank screen and create their own content that demonstrates their learning/understanding (learning through making/doing) rather than Apps that require students to pop balloons and pick objects in games that are nothing more than passive, glorified multiple-choice quizzes (with annoying music).

Content vs Creation

In the web album that I linked above, arguably the most essential folders are the folders called: create, explain, story, write, draw & paint, and mind map (in order of essentiality).

I would seriously consider completely avoiding content Apps completely for the first year and then introduce them in the second (or third) year when you know that students and teachers have made effective use of the creation apps. 

Once you place content apps on the iPad, they are like a drug, very hard to stop teachers and students from being distracted by them, and relying on them as an "easy option" but that provide learning that is far from transformative and is often nothing more than redundant... You have been warned! Don't get me wrong, they have their place (otherwise I would not include any on our Master iPad image) but that it is exactly where they need to be put, 'in their place'—they need to support not dominate iPad use.

There is more that you will need to know later on, especially relating to the actual mechanics of how to do the cloning using iTunes etc, (not to mention how to actual use and teach with them) but I think this should be enough to get you started!

iOS Device practice and protocols

iPads, iPod touches, iPhones, collectively known as iDevices or iOS devices. We are all going to be using these more and more, so it makes sense to have a good idea about what you should and should not do with them...

Just because you can doesn't mean you have to... 

Not everything that students create on the iOS devices needs to be saved/exported/captured, often it is enough for it to be what it is and maybe shared with a peer, much liked working on a mini whiteboard. We have awesome learning moments/conversations/experiences with students that are rarely captured, this doesn’t make them less important, it just is what it is. That said ...

If you use the Reflection App on your Mac you can easily share student outcomes directly from any iOS device to a projector via a connected computer. That is often all you need to do.

The Reflection App—Wireless Awesomeness

As far as possible allocate devices to students so you can find lost work or know who to blame if there are problems.

While they can be used for reward/free play - (much like a pencil or paper) this is not their primary purpose, as far as possible you should have a specific app(s) and activity in mind.

Just like the Mac, use SPOTLIGHT to locate apps quickly and easily.

Use the folders when you want students to explore a range of apps within a specific focus, eg spelling, maths drills, etc.

A longer term activity can be saved, to be continued at a later time, but only do this if you know the student will be able to use the exact same device later.

Sharing iPad Content

IF you need to capture/export media from an iOS device here are some guidelines:

Most apps will export directly to the photo app, including video outcomes. Media which is smaller in size, ie less than 1 MB like text and images can be easily emailed to any email address (usually the student or teacher) from the device. Once an email address has been used once, the device will 'remember' the email address for ease of use in the future. It will also 'remember' mistakes, so for this reason it is a good idea to supervise students the first time they email from the device.

For larger Media, ie, larger than 1 MB, like video outcomes, it is generally easier to use an iOS Device cable to transfer the media to a computer. Although there are a range of wireless ways to do this, Google Photos, DropBox, SendAnywhere, iCloud Photo sharing, it's hard to beat the reliability and simplicity of a cable.

Some (not many) apps use a slightly more convoluted method to export media, which is why it always important that you trial an app before using it with an entire class...

If you use the Reflection App on your Mac you can also capture this content (screen capture) using the reflection app on the mac, which will save it as a video file. This can also be another useful way to get content off an iOS device.

Once the media has been exported please encourage students to erase the contents from the iPad, especially deleting recorded images and video from the photo app.

Confused about sizes? See this post.

Some top tips:

Tapping and double tapping are common techniques on an iOS device, but also remember the tap and hold technique, which usually behaves in a very similar way to the right click on a mouse.

Double clicking the home button (or swiping 4 fingers up) will bring up the multitasking menu allowing you to easily switch between apps that are running. For example between Safari and a Pages document.

4 fingers swipes to the left and right allows you to quickly switch between apps.

From the multitasking menu you can quit apps that are running. IMPORTANT: You do NOT need to close apps that are running in the background, this is a common myth. But this is a useful way to quit apps that may have hung/frozen. But is probably easier to just shut the device down and start it up again.

You do not need to shutdown an iOS device very often, just pressing the power button (top right corner) to send it to sleep is enough.

Be vigilant and discourage students from changing the settings, a common one is to invert the screen making it pretty much useless for anyone else to use. This is another good reason for assigning specific iOS devices to specific students.

Always always always remind students to LOG OUT of any app they have logged in to, eg Popplet, Google Apps, etc. otherwise the next student who uses the iPad will be able to access their account directly. Remember these devices were not designed with multiple users in mind - we are repurposing them for an educational context.

You to do not need to leave an iOS device charging, this will only shorten battery life, it is better to only plug them in for one overnight charge when they are below 50 % in battery life. Avoid leaving them charging (cooking) over weekends and holidays.

Screen shots are a great way to quickly capture a moment. Just hold the power and home buttons at the same time. The photo will be added to the camera roll.

iOS device Email accounts

I have created email accounts for each grade, this is if you or a specialist would rather not use your own email account to receive media from students. These are already saved onto every iOS device so just typing in for example 'g1' in the to field of an email will automatically fill in the grade 1 account email address. Then you or a TA/helper can login to that account at a computer to access and download the media. Specialists find these accounts particularly useful.

Remote Device Management

If you have reliable wifi support, then this is something you really need to consider. Basically it's a way to control all the iPads wirelessly, once you've set up (enrolled) each iPad into the system you are using, there a few competing solution out there, such as Casper and Filewave—we went with the latter, but if you have a lot of iPads it gets expensive, like easily $7 USD per device expensive... but the gains in terms of hours of manually managing every single device may make it worth it. The good news, if you're only managing a small number of iPads (ie less than 100) is there a free solutions out there, like Cisco's Meraki, a colleague of mine uses this system in her school in Australia, and has this to say:

"...so far Meraki seems really user friendly. You can easily add and remove apps from a series of iPads with the click of a mouse."

There is one big con to this management method, but so many pros that it makes up for it.

Cons:

• Cost: unless you have less that 100 iPads, it is expensive.
• No folders: all apps will be pushed over the air, and arrive on the iPads strewn all over the place. We've always found being able to organise apps on the iPads in carefully named folders to be really useful (see screen shots above, from before we switched to a device management system). That said it is possible to arrange apps in folders on individual devices, but this has to be done device by device, not centrally. Kids will need to learn to use Spotlight to search for apps by name, generally all they will need is the first letter... 
• Payment: involves finding ways to circumnavigate Apple's payment systems, cloning devices is technically only legit for 5 devices, once you go over that you are in dodgy territory, paying for an app once and pushing it to 50 iPads is not really appropriate practice! Another more legitimate way around this is to purchase a load to iTunes gift certificates, and use those to purchase the apps on different devices... 

Pros:

• Time savings: all those hours spent waiting to clone every single device (restoring from a master backup) are but a memory. 
• Control: this will vary dependent on the system you choose, but you will be able to pretty much control every enrolled device from one computer.
• App sharing: Now you can easily move apps from one set of devices to another, especially useful for expensive apps... 
• Flexibility: someone desperately needs an app? With the manual system, someone would have had to install the app on every single iPad, with remote management, it's a few clicks of a mouse.
• Payment: now you can use Apple's VPP (assuming your country's App store supports it) to purchase apps in bulk and at reduced prices for education, then push those to any device you want. 

Welcome to the wonderful world of iPads in the classroom, they are a hassle to setup and manage, but they are so powerful for learning, it is well worth it!

Transforming Maths Practice & Practise

Why Use Digital Tools in Mathematics?

• Immediate feedback
• Infinite patience
• Personal (individual) differentiation
• (Less marking)
• Dynamic interactive models (what if)

SAMMS
Situated: work anywhere, any place any time. No carting around text or exercise books, all you need is scrap paper and a pen or pencil. Students can work out the own pace in their own space without having to do work pitched at a group of students in order to make the management of the task practically feasible for the teacher. No more having to set 'homework', now the homework is the classwork continued, and vice versa.

Access: videos and tutorials from some of the greatest Maths teachers on the planet is only a click away. Not to mention access to a wider range of strategies, and ways of explaining. Leverage the computer processing power of automated marking; faster, and more efficient than a human, freeing teachers to focus on marking the stuff computers cannot, and freeing time for teaching/planning. No longer do students have to wait several days to find out whether the work they did is correct or incorrect, they know as soon as they submit an answer and are able to work on each problem until they get it right without the need for teacher intervention.

Multimodality and Mutability: beyond text and static images to illustrate, they can use video to explain, and animations (animated gifs) to demonstrate visually/aurally, in ways that allow rewind, repeat, retry, as often as is needed. Interactive dynamic models allow students to really explore mathematical models, with 'what if' experimentation. Got it wrong? Try again. No limits, no stress, no strife. Undo, try again, repeat.

Socially Networked: via an online space, students can share their questions, clarification, celebration. Teachers and students alike can can help one, help many. The fact that students can receive so much of the mathematical support via digital resources and via each other means the teachers actual face-to-face time can be used far more efficiently to work with smaller groups that would benefit more from the personal touch that computers cannot replicate.

Who Says?

Well, there’s lots of research, but let's just focus on a few for the sake of brevity. I reckon the points they made (some time ago, I might add) will convince anyone who has any passion for the teaching of Mathematics that their argument make sense.

In Principles and Standards for School Mathematics (NCTM 2000), the Technology Principle asserts: “Technology is essential in teaching and learning mathematics; it influences the mathematics that is taught and enhances students' learning” (p 24). More specifically, a technology-rich environment for mathematical learning influences five critical features of the classroom (Hiebert et al 1997): the nature of classroom tasks, the mathematical tool as learning support, the role of the teacher, the social culture of the classroom, and equity and accessibility. An essential question when working in a technology-rich mathematics environment is how technology can be used (appropriately) to enhance the teaching and learning of mathematics.

An effective way to optimize the mathematical thinking opportunities presented by technology is to plan the mathematics task focused on the five Process Standards (NCTM 2000): Problem Solving, Reasoning and Proof, Communication, Connections, and Representation.

...

Learning environments that take advantage of virtual manipulatives offer a number of ways for students to develop their mathematical understanding. The authors identify the following as five primary benefits:

1. Linked representations provide connections and visualization between numeric and visual representations. 
2. Immediate feedback allows students to check their understanding throughout the learning process, which prevents misconceptions. 
3. Interactive and dynamic objects move a noun (mathematics) to a verb (mathematize). 
4. Virtual manipulatives and applets offer opportunities to teach and represent mathematical ideas in nontraditional ways. 
5. Meeting diverse learners' needs is easier than with traditional methods. 

Enhancing Mathematical Learning in a Technology-Rich Environment
Teaching Children Mathematics / November 2008


Then there’s this from the Centre for Research in IT in Education (CRITE) Bray & Tangney (2013):

An examination of the extent to a which recent technological interventions in mathematics education make use of the educational opportunities offered by the technology and the appropriate pedagogical approaches to facilitate learning, focused on digital tools classified as follows:

• Outsourcing of Processing power 
• Dynamic Graphical Environments (DGE) 
• Purposefully Collaborative 
• Simulations/Programming 

These are the guiding principles that have the potential to form the basis of a 21st Century model for the integration of technology into mathematics education. An appropriate and innovative technology intervention in mathematics education should:

1. Be collaborative and team-based in accordance with a socially constructivist approach to learning. 
2. Exploit the transformative as well as the computational capabilities of the technology. 
3. Involve problem solving, investigation and sense-making, moving from concrete to abstract concepts. 
4. Make the learning experience interesting and immersive/real wherever possible, adapting the environment and class routine as appropriate. 
5. Use a variety of technologies (digital and traditional) suited to the task, in particular, non-specialist technology that students have to hand such as mobile phones and digital cameras. 
6. Utilise the formative and/or summative assessment potential of the technology intervention. 

Students often wait days or weeks after handing in classroom work before receiving feedback. In contrast, research suggests that learning proceeds most rapidly when learners have frequent opportunities to apply the ideas they are learning and when feedback on the success or failure of an idea comes almost immediately (Anderson, 1996).

References

Aibhin Bray, Brendan Tangney Centre for Research in IT in Education (CRITE), School of Education and School of Computer Science & Statistics, Trinity College Dublin, Ireland

Anderson JR, 1996. The architecture of cognition. Mahwah, NJ: Lawrence Earlbaum Associates, 1996.

Bray, A., & Tangney, B. (2013, May). Mathematics, Technology Interventions and Pedagogy-Seeing the Wood from the Trees. In CSEDU (pp. 57-63).

Hiebert, James, Thomas P. Carpenter, Elizabeth Fennema, Karen C. Fuson, Diana Wearne, Hanlie Murray. Making Sense: Teaching and Learning Mathematics with Understanding. Portsmouth, NH: Heinemann, 1997.

National Council of Teachers of Mathematics (NCTM). Principles and Standards for School Mathematics. Reston, VA: NCTM, 2000.

Backups & RAID

I often get asked what the best solution is for backing up your data - a question that is best asked BEFORE you lose all of your precious digital memories, but sadly is often asked afterwards.

These days it's not uncommon for a typical family with a couple of kids in Junior School or higher to easily have in excess of 20-30 hours of video footage (still waiting to be edited) and several 1000 images. By the time your kids are ready to graduate it's a safe bet that you can double that - and at that size, chances are it won't all fit on your computer/s hard drive/s - which means you need a way to back up those files AND get them off your computer hard drive.

But first things first.

For storage of images and video you need to use a local computer hard drive, most likely the hard drive of your Mac. And to back this up you should use an external hard drive with Dropbox or Google Drive for everyday files, and Time Machine for everything else.

The problem comes when your local Mac Hard Drive is FULL, and you need to move that media off your Mac, just dumping onto an external drive is not good enough, as if that drive fails, (quite likely in my experience) you lose everything.

You can buy ANY Hard drive, they can all be reformatted on a Mac, using the Disk Utility Application, which will erase the drive and make it Mac (Mac OS Journaled), if you want to use it with Time Machine, or FAT 32 if you don't want to use it with Time Machine, and want to be able to read and write to the drive from a Mac or PC.

If you plug a brand new drive into a Mac, you should get a prompt from Time Machine asking you to format the drive automatically, all you have to say is YES!

RAID

What did you say? RAID? Do I really need to know about this—in a word YES. If you have a large amount of data you can't fit on your computer drive, then yes you need to learn about RAID for your backup solution. RAID means Random Array of Independent Disks, it means having your data backed up to more than one hard drive, so if one drive fails, and they do, you have another drive with your data on it.

If you do use a separate hard drive, make sure that you always have the data in TWO locations, otherwise it's not backed up, just moved. So if your Mac is FULL and you need to make space, this is not a good solution.

The solution for moving data off your HDD completely is to use a 'Hard Drive Enclosure' With a couple of Hard Drives plugged in.This is a 'RAID' set up... a big black box ($150 USD) with space for 4 drives to slot in, each drive can hold about 1 TB or more depending on what you buy...

Here in Singapore I bought the Probox 4 Bay for $195, at Sim Lim Square (Best Bargain and I bought two 1.5TB internal drives to slot into it ($70 USD each), so I still have two spare lots for later expansion...

I make one drive copy the other, so I don't have to keep it on my Mac - remember if the data is not in two places it's not backed up.

Mine looks like this when it's open, you can see where the internal drives can be slotted in, as easy as Lego.

They come in all sorts of shaped and sizes, but they all work the same way, data on one of the drives is copied onto another drive in the same enclosure, so now it IS backed up, and you can free up that space on your computer.

The process of copying that data from one drive to another can be done automatically, some of the more expensive solutions come with built in software that does this automatically, or you can just do it yourself, by copying data from one to the other manually, a bit tedious, but it gets the job done.

A prettier (and more expensive) RAID solution by Drobo

If you're confused about sizes of hard-drives, see my other post here. But a guide would be that each internal drive needs to be at least 1 Terabyte, so if you buy 2 you effectively have one, as the second drive is just mirroring the first one.

Typing vs Writing

Image: jomurpheyblogspot.com

Have you ever sat in the proximity of someone writing who can touch-type? They sit nonchalantly in front of the screen, their fingers dancing over the keys; meanwhile I sit hunched over the keyboard like Gollum, forehead facing the screen instead of, well, my face. Hunting for keys and pecking at the keyboard, before eventually, and with great trepidation, looking up at the screen only to be presented with a mangled representation of the thoughts I so diligently delivered with my not so deft strokes—littered with the red lines that demand I attempt again to wrestle the meaning from the scrambled melange of words, words that barely resemble the ideas I am attempting to represent, even now fading from my short term memory…

This may come as a surprise to many, but typing faster is not the primary objective of learning to touch-type; rather it is a desired side effect. Once you are able to type with all ten fingers without needing to look down at the keyboard, your overall productivity when using a computer will improve dramatically. When typing with two fingers (hunt and peck), "the visual and frontal cortices of the brain are forced to focus on where individual keys are located. Keyboarding removes this burden, enabling students to work on things like sentence structure and grammar while they type." (Typing Club Handbook)

Writing Defined

In the interests of clarity it's important to establish from the outset that there are at least four different ways of coding meaning using the symbols we call 'letters' that equate to sounds that we in turn translate into words, in other words—writing. Some of these are easily confused, this confusion can easily led to 'much ado about nothing', for example no matter the enthusiasm for touch-typing, no one is considering abandoning the teaching of handwriting, cursive maybe, but handwriting? No.

Wikipedia to the rescue:

Touch-typing:

Touch typing (also called touch type or touch method or touch and type method) is typing without using the sense of sight to find the keys. Specifically, a touch typist will know their location on the keyboard through muscle memory.

Hunt and peck/two finger typing/keyboarding

"Hunt and peck (two-fingered typing) is a common form of typing, in which the typist presses each key individually. Instead of relying on the memorized position of keys, the typist must find each key by sight. Use of this method may also prevent the typist from being able to see what has been typed without glancing away from the keys. Although good accuracy may be achieved, any typing errors that are made may not be noticed immediately, if at all." (Wikipedia)

Handwriting 

Handwriting refers to a person's writing created with a writing utensil such as a pen or pencil. The term encompasses both printing and cursive styles and is separate from formal calligraphy or typeface. It is, in essence, a visible form of a person's voice, including pitch and tone.

Cursive

Cursive, also known as longhand, script, handwriting, joined-up writing et cetera, is any style of penmanship in which the symbols of the language are written in a conjoined and/or flowing manner, generally for the purpose of making writing faster. Formal cursive is generally joined, but casual cursive is a combination of joins and pen lifts.

Print-script or Block-letters

Print-script uses block letters, in which the letters of a word are unconnected rather than joined-up script. Block-letters (known as print-script, manuscript, or print writing) are a style of writing in which the letters are individual glyphs, with no joining. In English-speaking countries, children are often first taught to write in block-letters, and later may advance to cursive (joined-up writing).

Handwriting vs Touch-Typing: The Research 

There are a plethora of articles bouncing around the web, more or less like this one, purporting in tones of moral crisis that the worst thing we could possibly entertain is a world with a generation who can no longer write in looping flowing cursive... These articles usually attempt to bolster their argument by making appeals to supposed brain research that evidences a higher level of brain function when putting pen/pencil to paper as opposed to tapping keys...

The problem with these arguments, as is often the case with attempts to leverage research within a field that most 'lay people' have absolutely no grasp of, is it's easy to completely misinterpret the data, usually in favour of a particular argument. We should all be very wary of the claims and 'The Seductive Appeal of Mindless Neuroscience'; over the past decade, neuroscience has become overprivileged as a method of examining the mind. That's not to say that it is meaningless, far from it, new research into how our brains work "offers educators an unparalleled opportunity for building a scientific foundation for educational practice which will allow us to make more informed decisions". It's just that we should be cautious when extravagant claims are founded on area of learning that is as best currently relatively nascent, "it is important to realize that neuroimaging is just one of many tools used in neuroscience. Equally important is the fact that it is widely viewed as rudimentary in its current state".

This article being a case in point; the author leaps to the assumption that the data must mean that handwriting is superior to typing, when the issue is not actually the mode of codifying meaning, it's the processing. So people taking notes who can touch-type have a tendency to transcribe, just because they can, rather than processing the information, ie summarizing, summing up, rephrasing. Touch-typists who do the latter rather than the former will be engaged in the same kinds of cognitive function as those handwriting. So the answer is not to demonise those who can touch-type, but rather to educate them.

"The thing is, that transcription process doesn’t require any critical thinking." 

“transcrib[ing] lectures verbatim rather than processing information and reframing it in their own words is detrimental to learning.”

Of course all of this makes the extremely dubious assumption that lecturing and the accompanying practice of expecting the attendant students to sit their and passively take notes is a medium of teaching that we need to desperately go to all sorts of lengths to support and enable. This couldn't be further from the truth, as acclaimed Harvard Professor, Eric Mazur realised years ago, when he discovered that the notion that the clear, polished lectures and demonstrations he was delivering to lecture halls populated mainly by premed and engineering students was successful “was a complete illusion, a house of cards.” Now his focus has moved away from the lectern and toward the physical and imaginative activity of each student in class. Now his focus on "interactive pedagogy turns passive, note-taking students into active, de facto teachers who explain their ideas to each other and contend for their points of view. Thousands of research studies on learning indicate that “active learning is really at a premium." It’s the most effective thing. Not note taking, and certainly not lecturing.

Yes, I realise that not all of us are as fortunate as the students of Professor Mazur, so what do we do when we are confronted with the reality that some teachers still cling to this inefficient practice? Simple, don't transcribe, process and reframe (and get a better a teacher if you possibly can).

Note taking really has nothing to do with handwriting or touch-typing. The people I feel for when these debates erupt, are our students who, due to 'special needs' have to type because they don't have the fine motor skills to write, do we really want them to feel like the modes that they have to use are actually inferior?

Stop taking notes and listen!

Personally I like the best of both, but as a general practice, I avoid taking notes at all, and I'm not the only one.. This way I can concentrate on the content being communicated, if there is the odd fascinating fact/finding/phenomenon that I absolutely have to record, I take notes by hand, mainly because I find using the temptations proffered by a digital device (know thyself!) quite distracting. After all, all note taking really is is yet another form of the rightly demonised 'multi-tasking' which just results in another 'lose-lose' scenario...  So I minimise note-taking, and later on dictate my core recollections into screen text, (I can't touch-type—yet) which usually involves still more of that all important processing. Also in this day and age, I think we should expect the presenter to provide notes online.

Having trawled the literature I can honestly say that the findings do many things, but criticise the need to learn the skill of touch-typing they do not. The arguments they do make are moot points, as their findings are at best tangential to the questions that surround the considerations that related to touch-typing:

• We learn how to form/recognise letters via handwriting (not cursive), fair enough, but this is an argument for learning block-letters, or print-script, in kindergarten, not an argument for learning cursive.
• There are possible benefits to writing cursive, but they still concede this is not an argument against learning touch-typing, more an argument against abandoning cursive, so not either/or but both.
• 'Hunt and peck' typing is faster and more efficient than cursive, in experienced adults, but slower and less efficient with young children. But ‘hunt and peck’ is still considerably inferior to touch typing in terms of its conduciveness for good writing..
• Research asserting that handwriting is better for note-taking is widely misinterpreted, it's the practice of transcription as opposed to processing that is the issue, not the medium—for our Learning Support students this is an especially important point. Touch-typing does not render them second class citizens in the arena of understanding.
• Regardless of the arguments for/against, there are profound cognitive benefits to students who can touch type compared to those relying on a 'hunt and peck ' strategy. 

There is also plenty of research that compares touch typing favourably to handwriting:

The computer vs. The pen: a comparative study of word processing... 

"students in the Computer group, on the whole, wrote better than those in a Pen group. According to the Jacobs et al. (1981) Composition Profile, all aspects of writing except Content and Organization showed highly significant differences, with the Computer group exhibiting superior performance".
http://www.tandfonline.com/doi/abs/10.1080/0958822950080106

The need for handwriting to aid letter recognition in the early years

The influence of writing practice on letter recognition in preschool children: A comparison between handwriting and typing. "The results showed that in the older children, the handwriting training gave rise to a better letter recognition than the typing training."
http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0001691804001167

Teaching elementary age children touch-typing as an aid to Language Arts instruction

Typed writing has been shown to improve students reading, spelling, grammar, punctuation, and creative writing abilities.
http://www.jstor.org/stable/20198297?seq=1#page_scan_tab_contents

The word processing approach to language experience

The word processor not only makes LEA easier for teacher and student, it enhances the value of the approach as well.
http://www.jstor.org/stable/2019884

Looking at the keyboard or the monitor: relationship with text production processes

"In this paper we explored text production differences in an expository text production task between writers who looked mainly at the keyboard and writers who looked mainly at the monitor. Eye-tracking technology and keystroke-logging were combined to systematically describe and define these two groups in respect of the complex interplay between text production and the reading of one’s own emerging text. Findings showed that monitor gazers typed significantly faster and were more productive writers. They also read their own text more, and they frequently read in parallel with writing."
http://link.springer.com/article/10.1007/s11145-009-9189-3

Writing the natural way: on a computer

A model of computer writing skill is presented that consists of four stages of development‐‐(1) Writing Easier, (2) Writing More, (3) Writing Differently, (4) Writing Better‐‐representing the evolution of a natural computer‐based writing approach under favorable conditions. The relevant conditions comprise the starting state of the user and a range of constraints on computer use.

http://www.tandfonline.com/doi/abs/10.1080/0958822960090205

Image: Bruce Almighty, via persephonemagazine.com

Efficiency

The speed of (legible) handwriting (with or without cursive) is much slower with touch-typing. Over to Wikipedia for the breakdown of relative speeds:

The average human being hand-writes at 31 words per minute (WPM) for memorised text and 22 words per minute while copying (Brown CM, 1988).

Whereas an average professional typist types usually in speeds of 50 to 80 wpm, some advanced typists work at speeds above 120 wpm. "Hunt and peck" typists, commonly reach sustained speeds of about 37 wpm for memorised text and 27 WPM when copying text.

Go on, try it yourself, I used typeracer, and scored 35 WPM, first try, then timed myself writing the same text (so a slight advantage) as fast as I could by hand, focusing on speed over beauty, but still maintaining legibility, and scored ... 17 WPM. Pathetic, I know.

So to summarise: that's handwriting at 22 WPM, hunt & peck at 27 WPM (about the same) and between 50-120 WPM for touch-typists. So, if we don't teach our students how to touch-type they are in theory, after ten year sof 'hunt and pecking' at least no worse off than they would have been if we'd asked them to write it all by hand. Although research on cognition in relation to writing gives us some pause for thought when they politely highlight the fact that the hunting and pecking process effectively makes the cognitive process of writing far less efficient, as the resources which should be dedicated to composition are instead being dedicated to hunting for letters to peck. 

In other words, when you can touch-type, the cognitive load of writing and thinking at the same time are lessened and free up working memory for thinking—a bit like cycling a bicycle—once the effort required for remaining balanced, and changing gears et cetera are automatic, you can spend more time noticing/enjoying where you are going.  The same idea applies to things like decoding in reading via ‘sight words’, this frees thinking space for understanding instead of decoding.  The absence of effort in one frees cognitive space for the other…

So, the gains with touch-typing frees up cognitive space, and increases speed, with typing hovering in the range of double to triple the speed of handwriting. And of course none of this even considers arguably the most important element; digital text is capable of so much more than handwritten text.

Distinctive features of word processing that support creativity 

"We think that there are distinctive features of ICT that can support creativity and they can be described as follows: 'provisionality', 'interactivity', 'capacity', 'range', 'speed', 'accuracy', 'quality', 'automation', 'multi-modality', 'neutrality' and 'social credibility'."

Loveless A (2002) Literature Review in Creativity, New Technologies and Learning


"The provisionality of ICT enables users to make changes, try out alternatives and keep a 'trace' of the development of ideas. Interactivity engages users at a number of levels, through immediate and dynamic feedback. ICT demonstrates capacity and range in the ways in which it affords access to vast amounts of information locally and globally in different time zones and geographical places. The speed and automation ICT allows tasks of storing, transforming and displaying information to be carried out by the technologies, enabling users to read, observe, interrogate, interpret, analyse and synthesise information at higher levels. Quality can be recognised in the potential to present and publish work to a high standard of appearance and reproduction. Multimodality is reflected in the interaction between modes of text, image, sound, hyper textuality and non-familiarity..." p 94

Loveless, A., & Wegerif, R. (2004). Unlocking creativity with ICT. Unlocking Creativity: A Teacher's Guide to Creativity Across the Curriculum, 92.

Typing is Writing

Confession. I have believed for years that touch-typing is clearly useful, but not essential, why?

• a stubborn reluctance to commit to the discipline that learning this skill requires

• a possibly naïve expectation that keyboards will be go the way of the Walkman soon,

• the recent exponential improvement in the accessibility, reliability and accuracy of speech recognition tools like Apple Dictation.

However, I now realise...

• there are few, if any, life skills that can be learned in less than 3 months based on a commitment of 10-15 minutes a day that would literally reap benefits almost every day, for the rest of our lives, furthermore, with the plethora of online touch-typing tutorial tools it’s never been easier.

• keyboards (or similar) aren’t becoming obsolete any day soon, aside from the profound difficulties people face when thinking and speaking, as opposed thinking and typing, short of wearing a menacing helmet with sensors that allow the computer to recognise my thoughts (and who would really want that?), we are always going to require some sort of physical interface that we can interact with to be able to transmit our ideas into words.

• voice recognition tools lose their efficacy in a shared space, which as a teacher, and certainly for our students, is more than the case than not.

This is not an argument against handwriting, typing is also writing. Our choice, much like the difference between handwriting using print script or flowing cursive, is whether to become adept at typing or to resign ourselves to the mind numbing frustration of ‘hunting and pecking’. The keyboard is here to stay; our choice is to either master it, or to spend the rest of our lives wrestling with it.

Constructive Plagiarism - The Process

Cut, copy, paste, swap, then repeat. [peterellisjones]

The Process of Constructive Plagiarism

This post focuses on the 'how', for more on the 'why' see my other post.

It is rare in my experience that anyone actually bothers to teach the skill of summarising or paraphrasing text without plagiarising it, here is one excellent but unfortunately rare example of this. Below is the process I advocate, and one I have refined over several years.

Phase 1: The Gathering... 

Prepare a (digital) space to use as a container, if your assignment is confined to text only this could just be one long word processed document, or if you feeling a little more traditional, maybe or/and a notebook full of paraphrased notes and direct quotes with enough of a bread crumb trial in terms of  references to lead you back to where you found the information. If it is a 'media rich' assignment combining different media this could be a folder containing text documents, and collections of media such as photographs and video. In much the same way as you have been having to do with text, it is likely that longer videos will need to be trimmed down to the essential elements.

Embark on a research 'safari', this means reading/viewing widely and thoroughly. Thoroughly capture any and all content that you encounter during this initial phase, this could be in the form of condensed notes with blocks of text from books you read transcribed into your own notes (I use dictation software for this, I literally read important sections from the books I read transcribe my notes word for word, carefully including citation in the appropriate format (APA et cetera, with page number references), copy and paste content from original articles (carefully cited) and websites, including provoking discussions encountered on web fora, even transcripts from video material that is of specific relevance to the area of research. When you find an article of particular relevance, a useful strategy is to follow the thread of their research, for example if they cite a particular author to reinforce or verify a point that you think is of particular importance, look up that author's full citation in the bibliography of that article and then track down that article to expand your reading material, of course you can also add to that citation to your list. When reading research articles in PDF form, the notes you compile should include your own contextual notes that you should be inspired to write in the margins if the article is any good. Better still you could add as annotations to the PDF on screen, I like to use GoodReader for this, none of space limits you have to tolerate with paper, and easily searchable later. It is also very important that you attempt to capture any ideas of relevance, this includes ideas that are directly contradicting each other, if anything seek out contradictory opinions/findings that are effectively and intelligently presented. This will come in very useful later when you come to repurpose this material for your own needs.

Traffic Light Highlighting

A common mistake when reading and highlighting source material is having an approach that is too... homogeneous. Instead of just highlighting in swathes of yellow, the following approach is far more effective, as well as providing ample basis to relate the content you highlight to your own context, as essential aspect of the paraphrasing and summarising you will need to do later.  As the name implies, you use three colours when highlighting, and get into the habit of adding a note to everything you highlight, these notes are essential later on when it comes to deciding what to do with these selections, whether you will use as a direct quotation, or whether you will cite it but paraphrase or summarise it. 

Text highlighted in green is a reference you feel is essential, it makes a significant impression on you, sums up your own position in a way that is effective, eloquent, authoritative, it resonates with your own experiences in an especially powerful way. This is a quote you will almost certainly use as a direct quotation, but one you will 'write from', to expand on why it is that you feel its content is so relevant. 

Text highlighted in red, is similar to a green highlight, but it inspires in you the opposite response. While it may still be eloquent and/or authoritative, far from resonating with your own experiences, it very much contradicts them. This is also a quote you will almost certainly want to use as a direct quotation, and one you will 'write from', to expand on why it is that you feel its content is so badly mistaken. 

As with all of your writing, any arguments you make for or against an idea will be much more effective if you can back them up with references to other authoritative sources that you have gathered; this is where the colour coding is particularly useful, as you can cite your green sources to add weight to your argument against the red sources. 

Last but not least, text highlighted in yellow sits in the middle, it may not be a reference that is one that elicits a passionate response at either end of the spectrum, but the content is nevertheless relevant, informative, helpful, useful, pertinent, and apposite. These references are likely to be far too abundant to be of use as direct quotes—a useful rule of thumb I have encountered is the rule of one tenth; if the final word length of your assignment is 6000 words, then approximately no more than one tenth of those should be used for direct quotations. In this example, once you've used up 600 words as direct quotes, you would need to paraphrase or summarise the rest and of course cite it; this is a the most likely use for text highlighted in yellow. 

Patch writing/working AKA aggregation

When the initial phase is complete you will have at least one gargantuan word processing document filled with a mind boggling range of excerpts and content that spans a wide range of material that directly relates to your assignment focus, being careful to include the original references either from the article itself or from Google Scholar et cetera. This type of document is often somewhat disparagingly referred to as ‘patchwork writing’, although this connotation is generally because it is assumed (again) that this patchwork state is ready for submission. Generally speaking, it is easy to underestimate the skill needed to avoid patchwork writing, and it is usually easy to spot; if nothing else, because of spelling/grammatical discrepancies, to say nothing of erratic 'voice'—flawless for the plagiarised sections—less than flawless for the sections added to patch the work together. The 'voice' of a patchwork essay can feel extremely dissonant.

“Direct "patchwork" plagiarism occurs when a writer copies material from several writers and rearranges that material with no attempt to acknowledge the original sources.” (my emphasis)

Here’s a good description from one of my favourite sources that you are advised never to cite in an academic article, Urban Dictionary, (along with Wikipedia of course):

patch writing

A technique of writing an essay, blog contribution or research paper by cutting and pasting large chunks of source material and interspersing these with brief connective sentences. The end result is thus a grotesque patchwork of long quotations that reveals little or nothing of the named author's own thoughts or insights [I would argue that if the rewritten text does reveal a great deal about your own thoughts and insights, as opposed, or as juxtaposed to the original author’s, then it’s not really plagiarism any more, is it?].

Source material may be referenced or, when plagiarized, either presented without [or with] citation or in a cosmetically [really? How about articulately? thoroughly? carefully?] reworded format.

Yes, this patchwork is an essential early stage, but, believe me, with constructive plagiarism, it is far from being ‘patchwork plagiarism’. Why? Because we are about to embark on the next phase, as advised by the NIU:

"What sets patchwork plagiarism apart from direct plagiarism, however, is that, in patchwork plagiarism, the writer creatively weaves the source materials together with his or her own words into a paragraph that is a mixture of plagiarized and original material.

To eliminate this type of plagiarism, you should acknowledge each source that your ideas came from and either enclose the words taken directly from each source in quotation marks or paraphrase the material into your own words.” 

The distinction between patchwork plagiarism (no citations) and document that carefully includes clear citation is what Turnitin refer to as aggregation, work that 'includes proper citation but contains almost no original work':

Citations, references, bibliography 

It is very important at this initial phase that you meticulously capture the references to all the material you wish to cite if at all possible, this can be tricky if you are using text from blogs and online fora (this can be a rich source of intelligent, informed dialogue). Which brings me to another one of my gripes, when oh when will hyperlinking be permitted as a form of referencing in academic writing? I can dream, but for now, you have to show you can play the game of tediously building your list of references and bibliography. For the most part you should be able to get the citations using the usual citation tools. While Bibme, EasyBib and EndNote et al are useful (especially for building your own more obscure references, particularly primary, not officially published sources), my favourite is Google Scholar; search for the original article and you can use the citation tool to copy the reference in the style that you need to use. You should use a separate word processed document for this, ideally in table format so that you can paste all of the references into a new row as you work through this assignment, at the end this will become your bibliography, when you sort it into alphabetical order and put a heading at the top. Another excellent tool that combines all of these processes is RefMe, tracking all of the quotes you wish to use, along with your own notes, while also creating end notes—all of which can be downloaded as one aggregated document.


Done?
Now you are ready for Phase 2.

Phase 2: reEverything

Remix/reword/rewrite

Now you thoroughly read and reread through this document, once you thoroughly understand its contents, you make a copy of this document and begin the process of evolving it from its current form into what will finally become your own final assignment. It will need to go through many iterations and versions between this point and that point, as it evolves and mutates into a document that feels like yours, as opposed to feeling like a disparate patchwork of assorted quotations and extracts. Are there words or terms used that you don’t understand? Reword or find out what they mean, then rephrase so they make more sense to you. This is where the 'traffic light highlighting' referred to above really becomes useful, identify the 10% you will keep as direct quotes and get to work on removing, or rewriting the rest.

This process of interpolation/integration/isolation/clarification is the phase where you move to a very deep level of engagement with the learning in this area, don't be afraid to interrupt this process in order to gather more material as new questions arise and new dilemmas present themselves, as you start to formulate his document into something that feels like your own stream of thought.

Resequence/remove

Now you need to start cutting and pasting and moving text around in the document to create a narrative flow, is there a story emerging from these disconnected text? You gathered them all because they resonated with you in some way, so what is the 'picture' that is forming? Look for a pattern that links these ideas, if you encounter ideas that do not align with this rationale, then those ideas probably need to be deleted, don't panic, the original text is in the original copy of this document if you decide if you need it later. Without a doubt, one of the main challenges you will face using this method is a high word count, (another frustrating element of the game, staying under word length), far in excess of the limits that you will have imposed upon you. Time and time again the challenge of practising concision will be one that will force you to make decisions about what it is you really need to say and what is superfluous.

Isolate/focus/discriminate

Now you need to determine which of these sections is most critical to the understanding of your emerging rationale that you are trying to present. These should ideally be maintained as direct quotations from the original source, but of course this is highly unlikely to be an option, as most academic assignments are very critical of an overweighting of direct quotes. Exactly what they will consider an overweighting will vary greatly, good luck getting a clear answer on that one. Sections you wish to keep as a direct quote should be highlighted or formatted in bold so that you can clearly identify and contrast them from your own summaries and paraphrasing within the main body of the text that is starting to emerge.

Rewrite/rephrase/revise/paraphrase/summarise

Now you need to take the rest of the text and rewrite it so that it becomes your own paraphrase of the original text while maintaining the reasoning that prompted you to capture it in the first place. In order to be able to create a seamless bridge between potentially disparate ideas, you will need to write these connections yourself, you may find your own notes you captured in the process of reading to be particularly helpful here, transposing context from that in the original article to that within within which you work and learn also helps. If you made a point of capturing alternative/opposing perspectives during your initial research, this now becomes instrumental in evolving this document into something is more yours than theirs, that feels and sounds more like you, your voice, less like a patchwork, and a lot less like the original writers as you attempt to reconcile these different perspectives, or to align yourself with one against the other. This will require you to interpolate text and sequence it in order to be able to bridge the gaps between the various arguments and rewrite them to form a united and interrupted flow.

Again you will encounter paragraphs that you will struggle to rewrite because they were written so effectively by the original author, ideally you would quote these directly, but of course you cannot because you cannot over use direct quotes, so what do you do now? You paraphrase, so you attribute this sequence to the original writer and cite carefully, but instead of directly quoting, you paraphrase the paragraph instead as was so eloquently described by scribbr above; you will need to set the context for the paraphrased section by formulating the text preceding or following the quote or paraphrase to clarify the points you want to imply.

That's it, this is an iterative process, keep cycling through these stages until you have completed your magnum opus.

1. Remix/reword/remove/resequence
2. interpolate/integrate/isolate/
3. clarification/concision/Focus/Discrimination
4. Rewrite/rephrase/revise/paraphrase/summarise

Then do it all again ⇪ ↻

Many thanks to David Woo and Kurt Wittig for their feedback and their contributions to this post.

Constructive Plagiarism - The Practice

Constructive plagiarism, or 'actually it's okay to copy and paste' is the name I give to a research methodology that I believe should be accepted, no taught, in the classrooms of the 21st-century.

Obviously the name I've given to this method is designed on some level to set alarm bells ringing, but my assurance to educators is that we need to keep our eyes on the actual purpose of the research, the learning, not on outdated (copy+paste=plagiarism) methodologies and principles which are counter-productive, and counterintuitive. I say ‘21st Century’ because if ever there was a mode of operation that needed dragging into this century it is the models and modes of academic writing.

20th Century responses to 21st Century Possibilities

These images (above) are typical of the assumptions about the impact of digital technologies on research, and assumptions about how many educators assume there students will use them. These negative assumptions litter the internet with their tones of moral crisis (just Google image search 'plagiarism'), and quite deceitful in many ways, so much pretence. Let's pretend no one has ever researched or written about this, pretend your writing is wholly original—never seen before—and totally authoritative, pretend you can't copy/paste, ... no, instead block your ears and close your eyes, and write it all as if there is nothing else out there to use as a launching point, no one else's shoulders to stand on, no revolutionary, disruptive digital technology that could and should transform how this process of learning and researching works.

When we ask students to research a topic, the underlying assumption behind traditional guidance around plagiarism is that our students are going to construct a completely original piece of writing, or create a piece of work which does not contain any content that could be found in any other format that has ever been written or published since the dawn of time. Right from the outset this strikes me as an absolutely ludicrous proposition, as the oft quoted Newton said himself "If I have seen further than others, it is by standing upon the shoulders of giants.", the point being, as is also reiterated in the good book by Solomon, Ecclesiastes: "There is nothing new under the sun". Of course, the assumption in this context is that the primary mode of communication is text (because it generally is. Why? That’s another conversation), but you need look no further than the outstanding video series on Vimeo "Everything is a Remix" to see a powerful rationale for the kind of practices that I call 'constructive plagiarism'.

http://everythingisaremix.info

An Alternative Approach... 

Instead of this tech phobic paranoia about the impact of screens on research, I'm advocating that we embrace the ways these technologies can and should transform how our students research, particularly exploring the mutability of digital technologies. The negative assumptions behind the condemnation of students who copy+paste is that these protestors assume that this is where the process ends, rather than where the process begins. That, my friend, is the difference between plagiarism and constructive plagiarism.

The fact is that even our most supposedly original ideas and thoughts are a remixing of ideas, experiences, and content that we have encountered throughout our lifetimes and that we have either consciously or unconsciously internalised, remixed, reinterpreted and finally re-presented as our own original work. As David Woo says, “no true knowledge exists outside people: people construct individual meaning and try to agree on meaning in talking with each other”. So to set students the task of producing a wholly original piece of work is really an exercise in futility, at worst you are asking them to do the impossible, at best you're asking them to take other people's ideas, internalise them and re-present them as if they were their own, which is really nothing short of a form of plagiarism, albeit one where they make some effort to at least vaguely cite the original content.

Of course this is something we are likely to penalise them for doing, as the clearer they make the sources of their ideas, the more likely it is that their teacher will be able to discover their extent of their plagiarism. Now there is great deal more to this last point that I can't really get into here, suffice it to say that we need to build an intrinsic sense of trust, the alternative is a nightmarish ‘damned if you do, damned if you don't’ scenario where everyone loses. Students who are feel incriminated by exploiting the affordances of digital tools, such as their use of copy/paste, who then abandon any attempt at appropriate practice and start faking their citations, or skipping them completely for fear that if they leave a trail of evidence they are just increasing the likelihood that they will be ‘caught’.

Another common issue is students end up unsupported with an ‘all or nothing’ stance, ie you MUST write it all in isolation, not an empty page, if you copy and paste anything, that’s it, you’re effectively excommunicated. So we end up with patchwork plagiarism of the worst kind, not because the students have corrupt intentions or motivations, but because no one is prepared to teach them how to use copy/paste constructively.

Guess what goes in the middle... ? Image: Sean Savage.

How do we define plagiarism?

pla·gia·rism
the practice of taking someone else's work or ideas and passing them off as one's own.
synonyms: copying, infringement of copyright, piracy, theft, stealing.

So, let me be clear, I am not advocating plagiarism, I am advocating a more.. progressive/practical stance towards it. There is a practical compromise somewhere between the extremes of ripping off the work of others, and riffing off the work of others.

riff ‎
A variation on something.

Any variation or improvisation, as on an idea.

verb‎
To improvise in the performance or practice of an art, especially by expanding on or making novel use of traditional themes. (my emphasis)

https://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/riff

http://www.thefreedictionary.com/riffing

(constructive) pla·gia·rism
the practice of taking someone else's work or ideas and remix/reword/rewriting them until they become one's own.

The method stems from the assumption that when completing a piece of work, there is a limit to the extent to which you can directly quote the works of others (who of course themselves have actually remixed and re-presented other work that they have encountered in their lifetimes). It is generally advisable to avoid being overly reliant upon direct quotes within the body of your work. When I first began academic writing many years ago, I made the (naive) assumption that I could literally use as many direct quotes as I needed, assuming that those would not be counted in the word count, only my reflections upon those direct quotes, oh how wrong I was! My logic, both then and now, is that rather than attempt to try and pretend I can contribute a completely authentic and original contribution to this body of work, I'd be better off to thoroughly appraise myself of current thinking around the idea and then reflect and write about my responses to the key ideas represented in the literature.

And so it was that I was introduced to the "game" of direct quotation versus paraphrasing. This enotes discussion below highlights the heart of the confusion surrounding this issue:

"In general, you will need to use direct quotes and paraphrases in a master's thesis. I would say that you will generally need to paraphrase more than you quote. What I would do is to paraphrase most of what I was trying to say. Then I would use direct quotes to emphasize the most important points that I was getting from a particular source. You want to be careful about quoting too much, lest it look like you do not understand what is being said and cannot put it in your own words."

"Paraphrasing shows how you synthesize, understand, and intend to use the material. It also shows your adviser and review committee that you can take an idea from someone or some source and reword it so that you are presenting this same idea in another way."

And that, in a nutshell is at the heart of constructive plagiarism, to paraphrase the above quote about paraphrasing, (is this a meta-paraphrase?) you take an idea from someone or some source and reword it so that you are presenting this same idea in another way.

Contrast that then, with this contradictory advice from the same discussion,

"it is probably better to overcite references than over paraphrase them. Under many circumstances, the review process of literature as well as the peer edit/ advisor editing process of writing a master's thesis also addresses the appropriate moments to paraphrase or to cite directly."

Or this, which effectively says do both...

"knowing that quotations are most important, knowing that structural and word requirements impose some limitations, knowing that other evidence that you have collected to prove your idea is also important, the answer to your question is that while paraphrasing is vital to demonstrating your understanding of a broad range of knowledge and to reviewing critical opinion and opposing arguments, you must have high quality and carefully selected quotations to substantiate the things you assert and claim. This may sound like a double-sided answer, but that is precisely what you need, a double-sided approach: You must include that which is most important (analysis and quotes) within the framework of that which is required.

http://www.enotes.com/homework-help/masters-degree-thesis-best-paraphrase-directl-393229

So we find ourselves in a somewhat confusing situation whereby we teach our students that the body of their research cannot be just their own opinion, and has to clearly show that every idea that they wrestle with, actually already has a precedent in some other body of work, and yet at the same time they're not allowed to be overly reliant upon quoting these works, instead they have to play the game where once they have used up the amount of text they can dedicate to direct quotes, they then have to work around it by paraphrasing direct quotes to integrate them into their assignment. Or to put it another way, to make those authors' words sound like theirs. That is how we end up in the position I call 'constructive plagiarism'. Namely the skill of taking a wide range of direct quotations from a wide range of sources and authors and then remixing and reworking those into a new seamlessly integrated piece of prose that clearly summarises and represents the ideas that were articulated in the original texts clearly, but has clearly been processed through their own worldview and experiences to represent their own remix of the many sources from which they were influenced.

This is where we get into the complexity of citation, when making direct quotes they should ideally be referenced in a bibliography, when you have paraphrased content that was originally a direct quote, instead this becomes a reference. In my experience very few academics require you to distinguish between these two, in which case we move closer to the ambiguity that is represented by constructive plagiarism...

I think the folks over at scribbr sum up this quandary well with the following:

Quoting

Quoting is when you literally copy a part of a text. It is wise to limit the use of quotes, as they do not improve the readability of your thesis.

Plus, if you use many quotes, you will seem lazy. Next to that, when you use a quote it can give the impression that you did not understand the source or that you did not read the entire text. It is therefore wise to use a quote only when necessary.

For example, you can use one when you want to provide a definition of a certain concept. You can also consider using one when the author has written a sentence so beautifully or powerfully that a paraphrase would diminish the quality of the text.

[...]

Always try to keep a quote as short as possible, preferably no longer than a few sentences. You can also shorten a quote; for example, you might replace a redundant or irrelevant part of a quote with ellipses (…).

However, make sure not to take a quote out of its context by, for instance, citing only one sentence that supports your research in a study that otherwise contradicts your research.

Paraphrasing

When you paraphrase something, you describe a (part of a) study in your own words. Doing so, you can fit an existing theory into your own research very easily.

However, even though the paraphrase is in your own words, the idea is still someone else’s. Therefore, you always have to cite your source when you paraphrase.

It is also important to always introduce the paraphrase. You can do this as follows: “Janssen (2008) states in his research that …”

https://www.scribbr.com/citing-sources/paraphrasing-quoting-summarizing-thesis/


The standout sentence to me in that quotation is "However, even though the paraphrase is in your own words, the idea is still someone else’s. Therefore, you always have to cite your source when you paraphrase." (ibid) This gets to the very heart of this game whereby they as the author is attempting to convey the idea that these ideas of theirs, are not comprised solely of their own ideas, but are an amalgamation of (hopefully many) other authors ideas over time and a range of contexts that have been repurposed to better fit their particular situation. Allow me to quote another colleague here:

“Appealing to authority makes the message digestible with less heartburn if done well. Here I picture a street fight. A direct quote is pushing Einstein out in front of you to intimidate the foes. Paraphrasing is walking out to meet the foes head-on with Einstein, Hawking, and all the other giants that went into forming the idea trailing behind making your knuckle cracking all the more convincing.” Kurt Wittig

Back over to the good folks at scribbr, who have this further helpful advice to give:

Paraphrase or summary?

The term “paraphrase” is generally used when someone describes someone else’s [words] research in their own words. However, this is not entirely correct. A paraphrase is a description of a certain quote from someone else, put in your own words. A paraphrase is therefore approximately of the same length as the source text’s quote.

When you completely or partially describe the outcome of a more substantial part of the research, it is called a summary.

There is a distinct difference between paraphrasing and summarizing. However, in general (as is also the case in many universities), both are called paraphrasing.

General tips

• Only quote or paraphrase the authors of papers that are authoritative in their field of research. 
• It is important that the quote or paraphrase has added value for your research. The quote or paraphrase should also fit in with the rest of the text. The text preceding or following the quote or paraphrase should clarify what you want to imply.
• A quote or paraphrase is not complete without a proper in-text citation and entry in your reference list, formatted correctly in the appropriate referencing style.

As a case in point, if this was an academic assignment that I was submitting for formal credit, the above quotations from Scribbr would be too excessive to use as a direct quotation, so instead I would have to play the game of choosing one or two sentences and either omitting or paraphrasing the rest, and that’s just one point! Fortunately for me, I don't have to play that game here, and can just let them be, I'm excused from playing the game, and freed to focus on my learning, and wrestling with words that capture my thoughts. And so it is that the process of constructive plagiarism commences. If they have read widely (and they should) they will inevitability find themselves in a situation where they have far more content that they wish to use than they can possibly directly quote, so instead, they begin the process of paraphrasing huge amounts of content that contain essential ideas and themes, as the only other method for doing justice to these ideas they have collected would be to directly quote them, which they cannot do for the reasons outlined above.

Constructive plagiarism then, is the process of remixing and reworking swathes of direct quotes from a wide range of source material while being careful to ensure that they cite the original authors clearly, but relying on paraphrasing and summarising enough to keep direct quotes to a minimum. When they exceed the amount of text they can realistically use as a direct quotation, they switch to paraphrasing/rewriting mode. In this mode they still credit the author but they effectively re-write the direct quotation into a different tense or apply it to a familiar context so that the voice sounds more like theirs then the original author's. Unfortunately, this is more difficult than it sounds, they have to be fairly adept at writing to be able to take the voices and insights of multiple authors and rewrite them so that they sound consistently like they own. In order to be able to do this they need to understand the content thoroughly, they need to be very well read, and they need to have a thorough understanding of the context within which they are writing, which takes me to the point of this entire process, the learning.

What’s the point?

Whenever I hear teachers wringing their hands, expressing consternation over the likelihood of their students constructing written assignments through processes that seem to border on plagiarism, I rarely hear any reference to the actual point of the activity, which is surely to motivate students to research widely, to internalise what they learn, and to represent it simply and clearly in a form that allows the teacher to accurately appraise the extent to which the student has understood the exercise. If the goal really is to motivate students to learn, then we should be less concerned about the minutiae of rules around plagiarism, and be more concerned about motivating students to read widely, research thoroughly, and to present their findings and sources clearly. I believe that a student who does this, is a student who has achieved the goal that the teacher had in mind, namely to learn about the area in question, through a thorough engagement with the material, and by presenting this understanding in a format that is concise and clear.

So, how does this work?

So, you're convinced and you want to know how it is you teach students to leverage the affordances of digital tools, rather than waste time ignoring or even penalising students for using them? Great, more on the actually nitty gritty of how this process actually works, this post:

Constructive Plagiarism - The Process

Many thanks to David Woo and Kurt Wittig for their feedback and their contributions to this post.