The Basics for Using

Why TurnItIn? Keiser University has invested in TurnItIn.com because it helps improve the quality of instruction in all academic areas. Computer-aided monitoring of students’ originality holds them accountable for more thorough mastery of content.

Getting Started Obtain a username and password from your campus’s new account administrator Visit turnitin.com and sign in with the username and password.

Getting Started Click the green plus sign to add a class. To add a class, you only need the name of the class.

Getting Started Once you’ve added the class, a pop-up window provides you an enrollment ID to provide students. Students new to the product will be able to create an account with this enrollment ID. Students who have used Tii before can use the enrollment ID and password to join your class.

Getting Started Now that you have created a class, create an assignment by clicking on the plus sign for New Assignment. Each new assignment in Tii creates a dropbox students can use to submit their work.

Getting Started Give the assignment a name. Specify the date you will begin accepting submissions and the due date. The “point value” and “post date” fields are for instructors who use Tii as a course management system.

Getting Started Under “more options,” you can specify whether TurnItIn should: Exclude small matches Exclude quoted material Exclude bibliographic references All these settings can be changed before or after the dropbox is set up. Your class home page now shows the assignment dropbox:

Setting Up Revision Assignments Revision assignments give students an opportunity to revise an assignment based on the originality report. The revision assignment dropbox avoids assignments appearing to be plagiarized because of similarity between two drafts of the same assignment. From the class home page, click New Assignment.

Setting Up Revision Assignments When you specify revision assignment, instead of naming the new assignment, you are asked to choose from among your existing assignments from a drop-down menu.

Setting Up Revision Assignments Be sure to allow students to review their originality reports so they can see if they have over-relied on their sources.

Managing Classes Once students have handed in an assignment, they are listed in the dropbox according to similarity index. The similarity index, expressed as a percent, simply expresses the amount of text that matches other submissions or web-based sources.

Originality Reports Click on the similarity index to see the originality report. Originality reports show teachers and students where their work is similar to other students’ paper or documents on the internet.

Coaching Students Arbitrary thresholds for originality/similarity are not useful. Originality expectations vary from assignment to assignment. Instructors should ask themselves, “To what is the paper similar?” and “In what way is the paper similar?”

Coaching Students Encourage students to achieve higher originality scores by paraphrasing more and quoting less. Encourage students to develop the habit of learning material well enough to write about it without looking at it.

Coaching Students Similarity to scholarly sources can be acceptable if it is documented correctly. Similarity to low-quality web sites and free term paper sources probably represents academic dishonesty.

Coaching Students Self-plagiarism should be discouraged. Never assume an assignment has been plagiarized solely on the basis of its similarity index. You must consult the originality report to see details before forming a judgment about a student’s performance.