Supervising and examining research students
Topic: Research skills training
Do you know what academic integrity understandings and skills your postgraduate research students start with, and what to do if there's a gap?
This topic is designed to help you to improve:
- your understanding of the range of authoring abilities and assumptions that exists among beginning research students
- your skills in diagnosing and addressing the needs of beginning research students in relation to originality and plagiarism
To learn more about this topic, review your own practices with beginning research students.
Further reading on this topic :
McGowan, U. (2002, April 18-19). Plagiarism or language development? An issue for international postgraduate research students. In M. Kiley & G. Mullins (Eds.), Quality in Postgraduate Research: Integrating Perspectives. CELTS, University of Canberra.
‘This paper addresses a recurring issue for language and learning advisers… there is an urgency for the academic discussion of plagiarism to be informed about the nature of language in research genres, and to separate the unacceptable ‘cheating' aspect of plagiarism from the inadvertent one which can result during a time of language development.” (abstract)
Nimon, M. (2002). Preparing to teach ‘the literature review’: Staff and student views of the value of a compulsory course in research education. Australian Academic & Research Libraries, 33(3). Retrieved June 1, 2006 from http://www.alia.org.au/publishing/aarl/33.3/full.text/nimon.html
Six supervisors and eight students in the doctoral program of a School of Communication, Information and New Media were interviewed about their existing literature review practices and their desire for more training in this area. Loss of personalisation, autonomy and time were key issues in their lukewarm response to formal coursework.
Stubbings, R., & Franklin, G. (2005). More to life than Google – A journey for PhD students. Journal of e Literacy, 2(2), 93-103. Retrieved June 1, 2006 from http://www.jelit.org/61/
Review of the literature and observation of postgraduate research students in a library setting suggest that they overestimate their information literacy skills and are reluctant to invest time in such skills development. A Loughborough University library project developed checklists and tests for flexible diagnosis of student needs, including citing ideas and avoiding plagiarism.
Overview | Research skills training | Quality assurance of the submitted thesis
Formative assessment of the thesis | Editorial support for research students