Identifying an Acceptable Paraphrase
Read the following passage and the information about its source. Then decide which paraphrase of the passage conveys the important information while avoiding plagiarism. Original source: Paul Revere's ride is perhaps the most famous historical example of a word-of-mouth epidemic. A piece of extraordinary news traveled a long distance in a very short time, mobilizing an entire region to arms. Not all word-of-mouth epidemics are this sensational, of course. But it is safe to say that word of mouth is—even in this age of mass communications and multimillion dollar advertising campaigns—still the most important form of human communication. From: Gladwell, Malcolm. The Tipping Point. Little, Brown, 2002. The passage appears on page 32.
According to Gladwell, "a word-of-mouth epidemic" is best exemplified by Paul Revere's famous ride during which he warned his neighbors of the imminent attack by the British. His warning spread quickly across the countryside. Not all examples are so dramatic, but even today, with vast sums spent on advertising, "word of mouth is ... still the most important form of human communication" (32).
Read the following passage and the information about its source. Then decide which paraphrase of the passage conveys the important information while avoiding plagiarism. Original source: Some recent studies have explored the existence of behavior in toddlers that is "altruistic" in an even stronger sense—like when they give up their time and energy to help a stranger accomplish a difficult task. The psychologists Felix Warneken and Michael Tomasello have put toddlers in situations in which an adult is struggling to get something done, like opening a cabinet door with his hands full or trying to get to an object out of reach. The toddlers tend to spontaneously help, even without any prompting, encouragement or reward. From: Bloom, Paul. "The Moral Life of Babies." The New York Times Magazine, 9 May 2010. The passage appears on page 47.
New studies reveal that toddlers engage in altruistic behavior. Bloom reports on experiments in which toddlers, without external prompts, came to the aid of a stranger struggling with a physical task (47).
Read the following passage and the information about its source. Then decide which paraphrase of the passage conveys the important information while avoiding plagiarism. Original source: Unlike the staggered luncheon sessions I observed at Walton High, lunch was served in a single sitting to the students in this school. "It's physically impossible to feed 3,300 kids at once," the teacher said. "The line for kids to get their food is very long and the entire period lasts only 30 minutes. It takes them 15 minutes just to walk there from their classes and get through the line. They get 10 minutes probably to eat their meals. A lot of them don't try. You've been a teacher, so you can imagine what it does to students when they have no food to eat for an entire day. The school day here at Fremont is eight hours long." From: Kozol, Jonathan. The Shame of the Nation: The Restoration of Apartheid Schooling in America. Crown Publishing Group, 2005. The passage appears on page 176.
Kozol observes the strain on Fremont's students at lunchtime, when all of the 3,300 students in attendance are served in one 30-minute meal period. One teacher calculates that the extended walk to the cafeteria and long food lines create a 10-minute window for students to eat. What often results is that many students go all day without a meal (176).
Read the following passage and the information about its source. Then decide which paraphrase of the passage conveys the important information while avoiding plagiarism. Original source: The original vision of charter schools in 1988, when the idea was popularized, was that they would be created by venturesome public school teachers who would seek out the most alienated students, those who had dropped out or those who were likely to do so. The teachers in these experimental schools would find better ways to reach these students and bring what they'd learned back to the regular public school. The fundamental idea at the beginning of the movement was that charter schools would help public schools and enroll students who needed extra attention and new strategies. From: Ravitch, Diane. "Why I Changed My Mind." The Nation, 14 June 2010, pp. 20-24. The passage appears on page 22 of the article.
Ravitch notes that originally charter schools were supposed to reach at-risk students with better strategies and creative teachers. These teachers would then also find ways to share these innovations with more traditional public schools (22).
Read the following passage and the information about its source. Then decide which paraphrase of the passage conveys the important information while avoiding plagiarism. Original source: Scientists say juggling e-mail, phone calls and other incoming information can change how people think and behave. They say our ability to focus is being undermined by bursts of information.These play to a primitive impulse to respond to immediate opportunities and threats. The stimulation provokes excitement—a dopamine squirt—that researchers say can be addictive. In its absence, people feel bored. From: Richtel, Matt. "Hooked on Gadgets, and Paying a Mental Price." The New York Times, 7 June 2010, www.nytimes.com/2010/06/07/technology/07brain.html. Accessed 21 June 2016. The article was accessed online, in a version that appeared without page numbers.
Researchers explain that we erode our ability to focus when we expose ourselves to constant e-mail, messages, and other bits of information. These stimuli excite the brain but can become addictive, so that we become bored when the stimuli are removed (Richtel).
Read the following passage and the information about its source. Then decide which paraphrase of the passage conveys the important information while avoiding plagiarism. Original source: Assange also wanted to insure that, once the video was posted online, it would be impossible to remove. He told me that WikiLeaks maintains its content on more than twenty servers around the world and on hundreds of domain names. (Expenses are paid by donations, and a few independent well-wishers also run "mirror sites" in support.) Assange calls the site "an uncensorable system for untraceable mass document leaking and public analysis," and a government or company that wanted to remove content from WikiLeaks would have to practically dismantle the Internet itself. From: Khatchadourian, Raffi. "No Secrets: Julian Assange's Mission for Total Transparency." The New Yorker, 7 June 2010, www.newyorker.com/magazine/2010/06/07/no-secrets. Accessed 21 June 2016. The article was reprinted online without page numbers.
Assange makes sure that videos on WikiLeaks cannot be deleted, using multiple servers and backup sites in locations around the world. His goal is to make WikiLeaks documents impossible to trace or censor and to make the system impossible to dismantle (Khatchadourian).
Read the following passage and the information about its source. Then decide which paraphrase of the passage conveys the important information while avoiding plagiarism. Original source: Because of physiological and behavioral differences, exposures among children are expected to be different from exposures among adults. Children may be more exposed to some environmental contaminants, because they consume more of certain foods and water per unit of body weight and have a higher ratio of body surface area to volume than adults. Equally important, rapid changes in behavior and physiology may lead to differences in exposure as a child grows up. From: Child-Specific Exposure Factors Handbook (Final Report). United States Environmental Protection Agency, Sept. 2008, ofmpub.epa.gov/eims/eimscomm.getfile?p_download_id=484738. Accessed 5 Nov. 2009. The passage appears on page 1-1.
In its handbook, the United States Environmental Protection Agency sets out factors for assessing children's exposure to various contaminants and pollutants. Children are more vulnerable to chemicals than adults because they consume more food and water as a proportion of their body weight. Children's exposure to environmental pollutants through their body surface area may be significantly higher than that for adults. And as children grow and behaviors change, their exposure also changes (1-1).
Read the following passage and the information about its source. Then decide which paraphrase of the passage conveys the important information while avoiding plagiarism. Original source: Thomas Jefferson had made it unmistakably clear to Lewis and Clark that their foremost objective was to find "the direct water communication from sea to sea formed by the bed of the Missouri & perhaps the Oregon." But in his detailed letter of instructions to Lewis, Jefferson devoted more words to the Indian nations than to any other topic. Not only was Jefferson intensely curious about the tribes, he wanted Lewis and Clark to wean their loyalties away from the despised British traders and enfold them into the orbit of American trade and commerce. From: Jones, Landon Y. William Clark and the Shaping of the West. Hill and Wang, 2004. The passage appears on pages 130-31.
Thomas Jefferson's instructions to Lewis and Clark laid out their main goal, which was to find a water route west to the Pacific Ocean. Jefferson's letter, however, also made clear his great interest in the Indian nations they would meet and his secondary objective: Lewis and Clark should work to persuade Indian nations to trade with Americans and not the British (Jones 130-31).
