The sun is shining the birds are singing, our students are still keen and showing up for lectures, but soon the dark times will return when our students sleep in and begin looking for the academic philosopher’s stone that will magically turn their leaden study into assessment gold. Some will nobly forge their way into the forbidding and impenetrable texts we recommend, they may even choose to venture out on their own onto the information highways of the internet. But they must be warned, for this is a place of many dangers. Here lie the twin succubi of YouTube and Facebook, the false professors of wikpedia and google, and tricksters aplenty offering dull students the promise of easy progression.
So I say to you fair teacher, forewarned is forearmed. Read this and smite the little buggers.
Suarez, J., & Martin, A. (2001). Internet plagiarism: A teacher’s combat guide. Contemporary Issues in Technology and Teacher Education
http://www.citejournal.org/vol1/iss4/currentpractice/article2.htm
If you’re looking for a free online Plagarism checker you could try http://plagiarisma.net/ . I haven’t tried it myself but it seems fairly widely used.