How I would enlighten a new student to the task of Plagiarism & Referencing?..

Firstly, from my own personal experience of plagiarism and referencing, I will be the first to agree with anyone who finds the thoughts of it terrifying! After completing a previous course where I attended numerous classes on the subject alone, I can honestly say I am still waiting to fully master the technique. On the first day of college I found myself sitting in a large lecture room amongst 120 students, and hearing the two words 'plagiarism' and 'referencing' genuinely frightened me. The one thing I have found to be pushing me towards finally being able to apply this referencing efficiently in my work is simply practice. Practice makes perfect and there is no other way of putting it.

To those of you who are completely new to this form of academic writing, I strongly recommend printing out a copy of the Harvard referencing stanfordshire guide . It will be your bible for your duration of college! My first approach to get my head around referencing was reading this guide and I found it to be a significant help. Referencing is a technique that needs to be learnt and mastered. Patience and time is crucial in order for it to improve.

Firstly, let me start by defining both referencing & plagiarism. Why do we reference? We reference to "enable the the user to find the source of documents as quickly and easily as possible." (Pears & Shields 2004, p.1.). By providing referencing in your work you "demonstrate the breadth of your research, allow the reader to independently consult and verify your sources of information & avoid plagiarism." (Pears & Shields 2004, p.1.). Plagiarism on the other hand "is using someone else's words or ideas without properly acknowledging them."(Pears & Shields 2004, p.1.). It can also be defined as plagiarism if one is to put someones else's work "in another way" (Pears & Shields 2004, p.1.) without acknowledgement to the person.
The information and sources throughout this piece have been taken from 'Cite them right: referencing made easy' by Richard Pears and Graham Shields, another helping factor which is great for this topic.

Referencing List:
Pears, R & Shields, G (2004) Cite them right: referencing made easy, Newcastle, Northumbria University Trinity Building.

Academic Skills Tutors/Librarians, Information Services. (2012) Harvard Quick Referencing Guide, Available at: (http://www.staffs.ac.uk/assets/harvard_quick_guide_tcm44-47797.pdf [Accessed 22nd Novemeber].

Image Derived from: http://www.socialmediamom.com/2011/03/age-most-important-in-choosing-kids-books.html [Accessed 21st November].