Chapter 17: Integrating Sources and Avoiding Plagiarism

Image Source

Personal Reaction:
Chapter 17 from Patterns for College Writing by Laurie G. Kirszner and Stephen R. Mandell mainly explains how to integrate sources and avoid plagiarism. I really should have read this chapter earlier, because I was having a tough time figuring out how to start the process of integrating other people's information in my research paper. Because of this confusion (and having a cold), I wasn't able to write my paper as quickly or effectively as I would have liked to. The writing process would definitely have been much smoother if I had already read this chapter. But, now that I have, I will be able to use what I learned to make my research paper better.

This chapter is filled with helpful tips. One that really stuck out to me was making sure to take plenty of time to research and write your paper. For whatever reason, I did not do this. Thankfully, unlike the meme above, I didn't have to write a thirty page paper, and I did not put off writing it until the day before. But I was assigned a 5-7 page paper, and I only gave myself about 4 days to write my first rough draft, which was not enough. Clearly, I should have started working on this several weeks in advance. Now, I have to cram, which is stressful and not fun. In fact, I probably should be working on my paper right now, but I'm writing this instead. Oh, well. You live and you learn.

Professional Reaction:
Although this chapter is fairly short, it is packed with valuable information that I will definitely refer to whenever I am assigned a research paper.

In the first part of the chapter, the authors mention different ways of integrating sources into a paper, which are paraphrasing, summarizing, and quoting. They define and describe each of these briefly, and also include examples and guidelines for how to use these techniques. The rest of the chapter explains what plagiarism is and how to avoid it. I think all these tips, guidelines, and examples will help me integrate sources in my paper correctly, and help me to not plagiarize.

Written by Hayley Leach