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Why Students Cheat on Homework and How to Prevent It

One of the most frustrating aspects of teaching in today’s world is the cheating epidemic. There’s nothing more irritating than getting halfway through grading a large stack of papers only to realize some students cheated on the assignment. There’s really not much point in teachers grading work that has a high likelihood of having been copied or otherwise unethically completed. So. What is a teacher to do? We need to be able to assess students. Why do students cheat on homework, and how can we address it?

Like most new teachers, I learned the hard way over the course of many years of teaching that it is possible to reduce cheating on homework, if not completely prevent it. Here are six suggestions to keep your students honest and to keep yourself sane.

ASSIGN LESS HOMEWORK

One of the reasons students cheat on homework is because they are overwhelmed. I remember vividly what it felt like to be a high school student in honors classes with multiple extracurricular activities on my plate. Other teens have after school jobs to help support their families, and some don’t have a home environment that is conducive to studying.

While cheating is  never excusable under any circumstances, it does help to walk a mile in our students’ shoes. If they are consistently making the decision to cheat, it might be time to reduce the amount of homework we are assigning.

I used to give homework every night – especially to my advanced students. I wanted to push them. Instead, I stressed them out. They wanted so badly to be in the Top 10 at graduation that they would do whatever they needed to do in order to complete their assignments on time – even if that meant cheating.

When assigning homework, consider the at-home support, maturity, and outside-of-school commitments involved. Think about the kind of school and home balance you would want for your own children. Go with that.

PROVIDE CLASS TIME

Allowing students time in class to get started on their assignments seems to curb cheating to some extent. When students have class time, they are able to knock out part of the assignment, which leaves less to fret over later. Additionally, it gives them an opportunity to ask questions.

When students are confused while completing assignments at home, they often seek “help” from a friend instead of going in early the next morning to request guidance from the teacher. Often, completing a portion of a homework assignment in class gives students the confidence that they can do it successfully on their own. Plus, it provides the social aspect of learning that many students crave. Instead of fighting cheating outside of class , we can allow students to work in pairs or small groups  in class to learn from each other.

Plus, to prevent students from wanting to cheat on homework, we can extend the time we allow them to complete it. Maybe students would work better if they have multiple nights to choose among options on a choice board. Home schedules can be busy, so building in some flexibility to the timeline can help reduce pressure to finish work in a hurry.

GIVE MEANINGFUL WORK

If you find students cheat on homework, they probably lack the vision for how the work is beneficial. It’s important to consider the meaningfulness and valuable of the assignment from students’ perspectives. They need to see how it is relevant to them.

In my class, I’ve learned to assign work that cannot be copied. I’ve never had luck assigning worksheets as homework because even though worksheets have value, it’s generally not obvious to teenagers. It’s nearly impossible to catch cheating on worksheets that have “right or wrong” answers. That’s not to say I don’t use worksheets. I do! But. I use them as in-class station, competition, and practice activities, not homework.

So what are examples of more effective and meaningful types of homework to assign?

  • Ask students to complete a reading assignment and respond in writing .
  • Have students watch a video clip and answer an oral entrance question.
  • Require that students contribute to an online discussion post.
  • Assign them a reflection on the day’s lesson in the form of a short project, like a one-pager or a mind map.

As you can see, these options require unique, valuable responses, thereby reducing the opportunity for students to cheat on them. The more open-ended an assignment is, the more invested students need to be to complete it well.

DIFFERENTIATE

Part of giving meaningful work involves accounting for readiness levels. Whenever we can tier assignments or build in choice, the better. A huge cause of cheating is when work is either too easy (and students are bored) or too hard (and they are frustrated). Getting to know our students as learners can help us to provide meaningful differentiation options. Plus, we can ask them!

This is what you need to be able to demonstrate the ability to do. How would you like to show me you can do it?

Wondering why students cheat on homework and how to prevent it? This post is full of tips that can help. #MiddleSchoolTeacher #HighSchoolTeacher #ClassroomManagement

REDUCE THE POINT VALUE

If you’re sincerely concerned about students cheating on assignments, consider reducing the point value. Reflect on your grading system.

Are homework grades carrying so much weight that students feel the need to cheat in order to maintain an A? In a standards-based system, will the assignment be a key determining factor in whether or not students are proficient with a skill?

Each teacher has to do what works for him or her. In my classroom, homework is worth the least amount out of any category. If I assign something for which I plan on giving completion credit, the point value is even less than it typically would be. Projects, essays, and formal assessments count for much more.

CREATE AN ETHICAL CULTURE

To some extent, this part is out of educators’ hands. Much of the ethical and moral training a student receives comes from home. Still, we can do our best to create a classroom culture in which we continually talk about integrity, responsibility, honor, and the benefits of working hard. What are some specific ways can we do this?

Building Community and Honestly

  • Talk to students about what it means to cheat on homework. Explain to them that there are different kinds. Many students are unaware, for instance, that the “divide and conquer (you do the first half, I’ll do the second half, and then we will trade answers)” is cheating.
  • As a class, develop expectations and consequences for students who decide to take short cuts.
  • Decorate your room with motivational quotes that relate to honesty and doing the right thing.
  • Discuss how making a poor decision doesn’t make you a bad person. It is an opportunity to grow.
  • Share with students that you care about them and their futures. The assignments you give them are intended to prepare them for success.
  • Offer them many different ways to seek help from you if and when they are confused.
  • Provide revision opportunities for homework assignments.
  • Explain that you partner with their parents and that guardians will be notified if cheating occurs.
  • Explore hypothetical situations.  What if you have a late night? Let’s pretend you don’t get home until after orchestra and Lego practices. You have three hours of homework to do. You know you can call your friend, Bob, who always has his homework done. How do you handle this situation?

EDUCATE ABOUT PLAGIARISM

Many students don’t realize that plagiarism applies to more than just essays. At the beginning of the school year, teachers have an energized group of students, fresh off of summer break. I’ve always found it’s easiest to motivate my students at this time. I capitalize on this opportunity by beginning with a plagiarism mini unit .

While much of the information we discuss is about writing, I always make sure my students know that homework can be plagiarized. Speeches can be plagiarized. Videos can be plagiarized. Anything can be plagiarized, and the repercussions for stealing someone else’s ideas (even in the form of a simple worksheet) are never worth the time saved by doing so.

In an ideal world, no one would cheat. However, teaching and learning in the 21st century is much different than it was fifty years ago. Cheating? It’s increased. Maybe because of the digital age… the differences in morals and values of our culture…  people are busier. Maybe because students don’t see how the school work they are completing relates to their lives.

No matter what the root cause, teachers need to be proactive. We need to know why students feel compelled to cheat on homework and what we can do to help them make learning for beneficial. Personally, I don’t advocate for completely eliminating homework with older students. To me, it has the potential to teach students many lessons both related to school and life. Still, the “right” answer to this issue will be different for each teacher, depending on her community, students, and culture.

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You are so right about communicating the purpose of the assignment and giving students time in class to do homework. I also use an article of the week on plagiarism. I give students points for the learning – not the doing. It makes all the difference. I tell my students why they need to learn how to do “—” for high school or college or even in life experiences. Since, they get an A or F for the effort, my students are more motivated to give it a try. No effort and they sit in my class to work with me on the assignment. Showing me the effort to learn it — asking me questions about the assignment, getting help from a peer or me, helping a peer are all ways to get full credit for the homework- even if it’s not complete. I also choose one thing from each assignment for the test which is a motivator for learning the material – not just “doing it.” Also, no one is permitted to earn a D or F on a test. Any student earning an F or D on a test is then required to do a project over the weekend or at lunch or after school with me. All of this reinforces the idea – learning is what is the goal. Giving students options to show their learning is also important. Cheating is greatly reduced when the goal is to learn and not simply earn the grade.

Thanks for sharing your unique approaches, Sandra! Learning is definitely the goal, and getting students to own their learning is key.

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How Do I Stop Students From Copying Each Other’s Homework Assignments?

Five steps that worked for me.

Graphic of a test and student copying

My students, like students everywhere, are smart and funny and creative and wonderful in so many ways. Also like students everywhere, they constantly seem to be looking for shortcuts on their homework. One of the bus drivers told me last year that the kids openly ask her to turn the interior lights on so they can finish copying homework before they get to school! Sigh. At least they’re motivated enough to copy, right?

This year, I made it a major goal to stop students from cheating. I put this five-step process in place, and it really cut down on the homework copying in my classroom. Here it is. 

Step 1: Check the quality of your assignments.

First of all, it’s worth taking a close look at the kind of homework you assign. If you do a lot of worksheets, you might find those work better for in-class activities. Instead, try focusing homework on in-depth writing assignments and individual written responses.

If you’re a math teacher, having kids respond in writing about how they solved a problem always works, as does having them write their own problems or exemplars for what they’ve been learning. Anything that requires student-generated content is automatically going to be harder to copy.

Step 2: Check the quantity.

Of course, this creates a lot more grading than worksheets, which led me to reflect on the amount of homework I assigned. At first, I found myself overwhelmed. I had to wonder if this was how my students felt when they looked at a night’s homework load. If there had been someone whose grading I could have copied, I probably would have done it!

The result? I assigned a lot less homework as the year went on. Put your homework to this test: If it’s not worth your time to grade carefully, it’s not worth the students’ time to do it.

Step 3: Explain the changes.

Once you’ve started assigning less homework, you’ll want to make your reasons explicit to your students. “I’m assigning less homework because I don’t want to waste your time. That means that anything I do assign is really important, and it’s important for you to actually do it on your own.” This speech went a long way with many of my students, but I had another trick up my sleeve.

Step 4: Allow time to learn and make mistakes.

You might also want to try a few get-out-of-jail-free cards when it comes to homework. My middle schoolers are still in the process of learning how to budget their time and stay organized, and sometimes they make mistakes. I gave each kid three one-day extensions that they could use over the course of the year to avoid a penalty for late homework.

There were certain assignments on which these could not be used, like rough drafts we needed to edit or group projects. It lowered the general stress level and set a culture of respect and accountability that encouraged my kids to plan ahead. For the naysayers who say, “The real world won’t give them extensions,” I would respectfully offer my disagreement. What? You’ve never posted your grades after the deadline?

Step 5: Bring the pain.

Although this cut down on copying substantially, kids will always test your limits. That’s when you move on to the final step. It works like this: Read every word of every assignment. Make sure you grade an entire class at once so you’ll know if a phrase or a creatively spelled word seems familiar, and then hunt back through 35 other papers until you find the one it’s copied from. It is important that you identify when students cheat and that your justice is swift and merciless.

I had an escalating system of consequences for cheating. First time, you split the grade. If the assignment gets a 90, each person gets a 45. Second time, each person gets a zero and a lunch detention. Third time, it’s a phone call home in addition to a zero and an after-school detention. Not a single kid made it to the third offense. They have to believe that you’re documenting this and you’ll follow through. Let them see you putting their names in your file so they know you know what offense they’re on. It is a logistical pain, but it’s effective.

So did my kids ace the standardized test because they had done their homework all year? Not to brag, but their writing scores were pretty high. And I don’t think they missed out on many valuable educational experiences when I stopped assigning worksheets. After all, they’d have just copied them anyway!

How do you stop students from cheating? Come and share  in our WeAreTeachers HELPLINE group  on Facebook. 

Plus, check out  how to give meaningful homework, even when it’s not graded ..

How Do I Stop Students From Copying Each Other's Homework Assignments?

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How to Prevent Students from Cheating

Last Updated: May 4, 2023 Fact Checked

This article was co-authored by Emily Listmann, MA . Emily Listmann is a private tutor in San Carlos, California. She has worked as a Social Studies Teacher, Curriculum Coordinator, and an SAT Prep Teacher. She received her MA in Education from the Stanford Graduate School of Education in 2014. There are 7 references cited in this article, which can be found at the bottom of the page. This article has been fact-checked, ensuring the accuracy of any cited facts and confirming the authority of its sources. This article has been viewed 168,228 times.

Students will go to tremendous lengths to cheat in school like slipping a phone in their shoe. The possibilities for how to cheat are endlessly expanding, especially as students have more and more technology available to them. By taking steps to prevent cheating, you can better help your students grow into responsible and knowledgeable adults. With some forethought and effort, a teacher prevent cheating before it happens and can set up the classroom to help prevent students from being able to cheat.

Preventing Cheating on Tests

Step 1 Don't allow access to test materials.

  • To prevent this, never leave your keys hanging in the door and don't give them to a trusted student for any reason.
  • Also, do not assume that tests and answer guides left at school will be safe. If you are going to leave such test materials at school, be sure to lock them in a file cabinet and keep the key with you at all times.
  • Be sure to change your test content from year to year. This will stop siblings and friends in different grades from passing on last year's answers.

Step 2 Create several versions of your test.

  • Be sure that you keep track of what test version each student has. This can be done by numbering the version and having the students write the number they have on their tests.
  • Do not distinguish different versions in a way that can be seen from a distance, for example, by color. Otherwise, students can look around for other students with the same version.

Step 3 Give open book or open note tests.

  • Eventually your students will learn that having the material at their fingertips is of no use unless they actually comprehended the material.
  • For remote exams, webcam and screen proctoring can be used to ensure students are not collaborating or copying test contents that are not intended to be released.

Step 4 Give access to test questions before the test if it's closed-book.

  • That way, they will be forced to review more information than you are actually going to test them on but they will be prepared for the test.
  • You can give students the questions but not the answers.

Step 5 Require students to show a student ID to take a test.

  • This can be done either when entering the exam room or when collecting the exam.
  • Tell students ahead of time that you will not permit entry into the exam room or not grade an exam if the student does not appear on your roster, the student does not have an ID with them, or the student has a false ID.

Step 6 Allow students to use only items that you provide.

  • If leaning over to copy is a problem in your class, you may consider investing in dividers that you pass out at test time to keep students from looking over at one another's papers.
  • Letting students know you will be doing this beforehand will prevent some students from trying to cheat in the first place. However, it may drive some students towards other more elaborate ways of cheating.
  • For remote exams, if scratch paper will be allowed, require that students show the front and back of all scratch paper before beginning their exam to ensure it is blank. This can also be required prior to logging off at the end to ensure they are not copying exam contents that are not intended to be released.

Step 7 Have students take all items off their desks.

  • If you are especially worried about cheating, do not even allow students to have labeled water bottles on their desk. It is a common trick to write answers on the inside of the label and re-glue it to the bottle.
  • You may also require that backpacks be placed in the front of the room (or some other open space) rather than underneath desks for the duration of the exam.
  • For remote exams, require that students do a 360 degree webcam scan of their testing environment prior to starting the exam.

Step 8 Watch the students carefully during testing.

  • If you are teaching a large class, you might have teaching assistants that are helping with your class. Have them watch the students during testing, so that more of the room can be observed at one time. [5] X Trustworthy Source American Psychological Association Leading scientific and professional organization of licensed psychologists Go to source
  • For remote exams, watch all (or at least a subset) of the recordings at faster playback speed prior to releasing results.

Step 9 Request that students walk up to your desk to ask questions.

  • Allow only one student to leave the room at a time. This will allow you to keep track of who leaves and how long they are gone. If someone is taking frequent bathroom breaks, there is a chance that they have stashed answers in the bathroom.
  • You may tell a student that they must show you where their phone is, and require that it stay in the room.
  • For a remote exam, you may warn students ahead of time that unless such testing accommodations were required to accommodate a disability, bathroom breaks are not allowed.

Step 11 Keep track of where students are sitting.

  • This would be especially useful in very large university courses, where students may not know the names of those sitting next to them during the exam.
  • You can also create a seating chart documenting who sat where, if you have a small class. This way you can create a chart that keeps friends from sitting right next to one another. If you have a large class, number the seats and have students write their seat number on their test. [6] X Research source

Step 12 Move students you suspect are cheating.

  • If you need to reseat a student, try to put them somewhere where they are away from other students. Being a seat away from other students may make it easier for that student to focus on their own test.

Step 13 Limit a student's ability to change their answers.

  • There are some websites that allow you to return exams electronically. After all exams have been collected, you can scan them, match the submissions to students, grade the exams, and then release the grades online. Students will login to see their scores and a scan of their exam.

Preventing Cheating on Homework and Other Assignments

Step 1 Review the honor code.

  • Make it clear what the consequences of cheating are when they sign the honor code. You should also have these consequences posted on the syllabus for the class, so that students can refer to it whenever needed.

Step 2 Build trust with your students.

  • Part of building trust with your students is showing your students that you care about them. They are less likely to break your rules if they know that you are looking after their best interests and are invested in their success.

Step 3 Emphasize honesty with parents.

  • This will be especially helpful for students who have very involved parents.
  • Most cheating on homework is in the form of excessive collaboration or searching for answers on the internet. If you use this type of weighting and thoughtfully construct your exams, the exams will enforce the no cheating policy for homework better than you can.
  • The students who choose to cheat will likely have their grades lowered as a result of poor performance on exams. Those who are too used to being able to freely collaborate or use the internet may have a hard time with individual assessments.
  • This makes it so there is very little incentive for copying solutions and not very much energy needs to be put into dealing with cheating on homework.

Step 5 Have students show their work.

  • If you suspect a student copied off of another student for an exam question or changed their answer after the fact, ask them to reproduce or interpret their solution individually in your presence a few days later. If there is a large difference in their ability to produce that solution during the exam and reproduce the solution individually in your presence, cheating may have occurred.
  • If the work appears illogical, the student probably made a rash attempt to copy from a neighbor.

Step 6 Assign group projects and presentations.

  • In a group, each student will have specific responsibilities and they will be accountable to each other for the final product. When students are working together, individual students will find it harder to cheat, since that cheating will be exposed to their classmates.
  • While group projects and presentations will not eliminate cheating altogether, they do make cheating less likely.

Step 7 Copy assignments before returning them to students.

  • Should you catch a student modifying and submitting their work for a regrade, the photocopy or scan becomes hard evidence when you report the case for academic action.
  • This can often happen with students who are very close to the next grade up, who hope to potentially raise a B- grade to a B, for example. So, when photocopying or scanning a sample of exams before returning them, focus especially on those with scores near the grade boundaries.

Step 8 Do not accept any homework submitted after solutions have been released.

  • If a student has a good reason for not turning in an assignment on time, they should be given a slightly different assignment from the rest of the class, so that no cheating can occur.
  • In cases where assignments are reused from year to year, you may not be able to prevent somebody who gained access to the solutions from copying them. Therefore design your exam such that somebody who did not learn the material well cannot perform well.

Preventing Cheating on Papers

Step 1 Define plagiarism for your students.

  • These essay prompts should be changed when teaching new classes. Students may be tempted to plagiarize if students they know have written on the prompts you are giving.

Step 3 Make your expectations clear.

  • You can always state that you are OK with students working together, but what they turn in must be their own work. This allows them to work together but it also requires them to do some independent work as well.

Step 4 Use software that checks for plagiarism.

  • Most universities have this type of program built into the websites that they use for students.
  • If your school doesn't have this type of program available, discuss getting access to one with your supervisor.
  • There tend to be more cases of cheating in the computer science department than other departments at many universities, simply because they have great resources for automated cheat checking.

Step 5 Make regrade request deadlines soon after the assignment was returned.

  • This way, once the class ends, you are not pressured to review a ton of assignments that were returned months ago.
  • Students, especially those near the course grade boundaries, may want to make attempts to seek extra points to raise their course grades at the end of the term.

Community Q&A

Community Answer

  • If you find out about some ingenious and novel type of cheating do not post the specifics here, as students will then find out about it. Thanks Helpful 1 Not Helpful 1
  • The truth is that over 90% of students are actually honest, but the only way to be fair to those honest students is by being strict with those who may attempt to bend the rules. Thanks Helpful 1 Not Helpful 0
  • Don’t accuse people of cheating without evidence. Thanks Helpful 2 Not Helpful 1

how to prevent cheating on homework

  • Certified teachers may lose credentials for allowing standardized tests to be unsecured, taken, or read by other teachers or students. Thanks Helpful 6 Not Helpful 0

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Cheat On a Test

  • ↑ https://www.washington.edu/cssc/faculty-resources/tips-for-preventing-cheating/
  • ↑ https://www.apa.org/gradpsych/2010/11/cheat
  • ↑ https://www.apa.org/monitor/2011/06/cheat
  • ↑ https://citl.illinois.edu/citl-101/teaching-learning/resources/classroom-environment/dealing-with-cheating
  • ↑ https://www.edutopia.org/article/6-strategies-building-better-student-relationships/
  • ↑ https://www.uopeople.edu/blog/the-pros-and-cons-of-homework/
  • ↑ https://www.edutopia.org/article/setting-effective-group-work/

About This Article

Emily Listmann, MA

There will always be students trying to cheat on their exams, but you can help prevent this by limiting their access to their belongings and watching them carefully. Once you’ve printed the exam papers for a class, make sure you keep them locked away to deter any students from stealing a copy. When they sit their exam, have them place their backpacks at the front of the room so they can’t hide notes in there. You can also make them remove labels from water bottles, since students can easily hide notes inside. During the test, watch your students carefully for suspicious activity. If they have any questions, make them come up to the front so you can still watch the class while you answer the question. For more tips from our Teaching co-author, including how to check student papers for plagiarism, read on! Did this summary help you? Yes No

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The Real Roots of Student Cheating

Let's address the mixed messages we are sending to young people..

Updated September 28, 2023 | Reviewed by Ray Parker

  • Why Education Is Important
  • Find a Child Therapist
  • Cheating is rampant, yet young people consistently affirm honesty and the belief that cheating is wrong.
  • This discrepancy arises, in part, from the tension students perceive between honesty and the terms of success.
  • In an integrated environment, achievement and the real world are not seen as at odds with honesty.

RDNE / Pexels

The release of ChatGPT has high school and college teachers wringing their hands. A Columbia University undergraduate rubbed it in our face last May with an opinion piece in the Chronicle of Higher Education titled I’m a Student. You Have No Idea How Much We’re Using ChatGPT.

He goes on to detail how students use the program to “do the lion’s share of the thinking,” while passing off the work as their own. Catching the deception , he insists, is impossible.

As if students needed more ways to cheat. Every survey of students, whether high school or college, has found that cheating is “rampant,” “epidemic,” “commonplace, and practically expected,” to use a few of the terms with which researchers have described the scope of academic dishonesty.

In a 2010 study by the Josephson Institute, for example, 59 percent of the 43,000 high school students admitted to cheating on a test in the past year. According to a 2012 white paper, Cheat or Be Cheated? prepared by Challenge Success, 80 percent admitted to copying another student’s homework. The other studies summarized in the paper found self-reports of past-year cheating by high school students in the 70 percent to 80 percent range and higher.

At colleges, the situation is only marginally better. Studies consistently put the level of self-reported cheating among undergraduates between 50 percent and 70 percent depending in part on what behaviors are included. 1

The sad fact is that cheating is widespread.

Commitment to Honesty

Yet, when asked, most young people affirm the moral value of honesty and the belief that cheating is wrong. For example, in a survey of more than 3,000 teens conducted by my colleagues at the University of Virginia, the great majority (83 percent) indicated that to become “honest—someone who doesn’t lie or cheat,” was very important, if not essential to them.

On a long list of traits and qualities, they ranked honesty just below “hard-working” and “reliable and dependent,” and far ahead of traits like being “ambitious,” “a leader ,” and “popular.” When asked directly about cheating, only 6 percent thought it was rarely or never wrong.

Other studies find similar commitments, as do experimental studies by psychologists. In experiments, researchers manipulate the salience of moral beliefs concerning cheating by, for example, inserting moral reminders into the test situation to gauge their effect. Although students often regard some forms of cheating, such as doing homework together when they are expected to do it alone, as trivial, the studies find that young people view cheating in general, along with specific forms of dishonesty, such as copying off another person’s test, as wrong.

They find that young people strongly care to think of themselves as honest and temper their cheating behavior accordingly. 2

The Discrepancy Between Belief and Behavior

Bottom line: Kids whose ideal is to be honest and who know cheating is wrong also routinely cheat in school.

What accounts for this discrepancy? In the psychological and educational literature, researchers typically focus on personal and situational factors that work to override students’ commitment to do the right thing.

These factors include the force of different motives to cheat, such as the desire to avoid failure, and the self-serving rationalizations that students use to excuse their behavior, like minimizing responsibility—“everyone is doing it”—or dismissing their actions because “no one is hurt.”

While these explanations have obvious merit—we all know the gap between our ideals and our actions—I want to suggest another possibility: Perhaps the inconsistency also reflects the mixed messages to which young people (all of us, in fact) are constantly subjected.

Mixed Messages

Consider the story that young people hear about success. What student hasn’t been told doing well includes such things as getting good grades, going to a good college, living up to their potential, aiming high, and letting go of “limiting beliefs” that stand in their way? Schools, not to mention parents, media, and employers, all, in various ways, communicate these expectations and portray them as integral to the good in life.

They tell young people that these are the standards they should meet, the yardsticks by which they should measure themselves.

In my interviews and discussions with young people, it is clear they have absorbed these powerful messages and feel held to answer, to themselves and others, for how they are measuring up. Falling short, as they understand and feel it, is highly distressful.

At the same time, they are regularly exposed to the idea that success involves a trade-off with honesty and that cheating behavior, though regrettable, is “real life.” These words are from a student on a survey administered at an elite high school. “People,” he continued, “who are rich and successful lie and cheat every day.”

how to prevent cheating on homework

In this thinking, he is far from alone. In a 2012 Josephson Institute survey of 23,000 high school students, 57 percent agreed that “in the real world, successful people do what they have to do to win, even if others consider it cheating.” 3

Putting these together, another high school student told a researcher: “Grades are everything. You have to realize it’s the only possible way to get into a good college and you resort to any means necessary.”

In a 2021 survey of college students by College Pulse, the single biggest reason given for cheating, endorsed by 72 percent of the respondents, was “pressure to do well.”

What we see here are two goods—educational success and honesty—pitted against each other. When the two collide, the call to be successful is likely to be the far more immediate and tangible imperative.

A young person’s very future appears to hang in the balance. And, when asked in surveys , youths often perceive both their parents’ and teachers’ priorities to be more focused on getting “good grades in my classes,” than on character qualities, such as being a “caring community member.”

In noting the mixed messages, my point is not to offer another excuse for bad behavior. But some of the messages just don’t mix, placing young people in a difficult bind. Answering the expectations placed on them can be at odds with being an honest person. In the trade-off, cheating takes on a certain logic.

The proposed remedies to academic dishonesty typically focus on parents and schools. One commonly recommended strategy is to do more to promote student integrity. That seems obvious. Yet, as we saw, students already believe in honesty and the wrongness of (most) cheating. It’s not clear how more teaching on that point would make much of a difference.

Integrity, though, has another meaning, in addition to the personal qualities of being honest and of strong moral principles. Integrity is also the “quality or state of being whole or undivided.” In this second sense, we can speak of social life itself as having integrity.

It is “whole or undivided” when the different contexts of everyday life are integrated in such a way that norms, values, and expectations are fairly consistent and tend to reinforce each other—and when messages about what it means to be a good, accomplished person are not mixed but harmonious.

While social integrity rooted in ethical principles does not guarantee personal integrity, it is not hard to see how that foundation would make a major difference. Rather than confronting students with trade-offs that incentivize “any means necessary,” they would receive positive, consistent reinforcement to speak and act truthfully.

Talk of personal integrity is all for the good. But as pervasive cheating suggests, more is needed. We must also work to shape an integrated environment in which achievement and the “real world” are not set in opposition to honesty.

1. Liora Pedhazur Schmelkin, et al. “A Multidimensional Scaling of College Students’ Perceptions of Academic Dishonesty.” The Journal of Higher Education 79 (2008): 587–607.

2. See, for example, the studies in Christian B. Miller, Character and Moral Psychology. New York: Oxford University Press, 2014, Ch. 3.

3. Josephson Institute. The 2012 Report Card on the Ethics of American Youth (Installment 1: Honesty and Integrity). Josephson Institute of Ethics, 2012.

Joseph E. Davis Ph.D.

Joseph E. Davis is Research Professor of Sociology and Director of the Picturing the Human Colloquy of the Institute for Advanced Studies in Culture at the University of Virginia.

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How Teens Use Technology to Cheat in School

Why teens cheat, text messaging during tests, storing notes, copying and pasting, social media, homework apps and websites, talk to your teen.

  • Expectations and Consequences

When you were in school, teens who were cheating were likely looking at a neighbor’s paper or copying a friend’s homework. The most high-tech attempts to cheat may have involved a student who wrote the answers to a test on the cover of their notebook.

Cheating in today’s world has evolved, and unfortunately, become pervasive. Technology makes cheating all too tempting, common, and easy to pull off. Not only can kids use their phones to covertly communicate with each other, but they can also easily look up answers or get their work done on the Internet.

In one study, a whopping 35% of teens admit to using their smartphones to cheat on homework or tests. 65% of the same surveyed students also stated they have seen others use their phones to cheat in school. Other research has also pointed to widespread academic indiscretions among teens.

Sadly, academic dishonesty often is easily normalized among teens. Many of them may not even recognize that sharing answers, looking up facts online, consulting a friend, or using a homework app could constitute cheating. It may be a slippery slope as well, with kids fudging the honesty line a tiny bit here or there before beginning full-fledged cheating.

For those who are well aware that their behavior constitutes cheating, the academic pressure to succeed may outweigh the risk of getting caught. They may want to get into top colleges or earn scholarships for their grades. Some teens may feel that the best way to gain a competitive edge is by cheating.

Other students may just be looking for shortcuts. It may seem easier to cheat rather than look up the answers, figure things out in their heads, or study for a test. Plus, it can be rationalized that they are "studying" on their phone rather than actually cheating.

Teens with busy schedules may be especially tempted to cheat. The demands of sports, a part-time job , family commitments, or other after-school responsibilities can make academic dishonesty seem like a time-saving option.

Sometimes, there’s also a fairly low risk of getting caught. Some teachers rely on an honor system, and in some cases, technology has evolved faster than school policies. Many teachers lack the resources to detect academic dishonesty in the classroom. However, increasingly, there are programs and methods that let teachers scan student work for plagiarism.

Finally, some teens get confused about their family's values and may forget that learning is the goal of schooling rather than just the grades they get. They may assume that their parent would rather they cheat than get a bad grade—or they fear disappointing them. Plus, they see so many other kids cheating that it may start to feel expected.

It’s important to educate yourself about the various ways that today’s teens are cheating so you can be aware of the temptations your teen may face. Let's look at how teens are using phones and technology to cheat.

Texting is one of the fastest ways for students to get answers to test questions from other students in the room—it's become the modern equivalent of note passing. Teens hide their smartphones on their seats and text one another, looking down to view responses while the teacher isn't paying attention.

Teens often admit the practice is easy to get away with even when phones aren't allowed (provided the teacher isn't walking around the room to check for cellphones).

Some teens store notes for test time on their cell phones and access these notes during class. As with texting, this is done on the sly, hiding the phone from view.  The internet offers other unusual tips for cheating with notes, too.

For example, several sites guide teens to print their notes out in the nutrition information portion of a water bottle label, providing a downloadable template to do so. Teens replace the water or beverage bottle labels with their own for a nearly undetectable setup, especially in a large class. This, of course, only works if the teacher allows beverages during class.

Rather than conduct research to find sources, some students are copying and pasting material. They may plagiarize a report by trying to pass off a Wikipedia article as their own paper, for example.

Teachers may get wise to this type of plagiarism by doing a simple internet search of their own. Pasting a few sentences of a paper into a search engine can help teachers identify if the content was taken from a website.

A few websites offer complete research papers for free based on popular subjects or common books. Others allow students to purchase a paper. Then, a professional writer, or perhaps even another student, will complete the report for them.

Teachers may be able to detect this type of cheating when a student’s paper seems to be written in a different voice. A perfectly polished paper may indicate a ninth-grade student’s work isn’t their own. Teachers may also just be able to tell that the paper just doesn't sound like the student who turned it in.

Crowdsourced sites such as Homework Helper also provide their share of homework answers. Students simply ask a question and others chime in to give them the answers.

Teenagers use social media to help one another on tests, too. It only takes a second to capture a picture of an exam when the teacher isn’t looking.

That picture may then be shared with friends who want a sneak peek of the test before they take it. The photo may be uploaded to a special Facebook group or simply shared via text message. Then, other teens can look up the answers to the exam once they know the questions ahead of time.

While many tech-savvy cheating methods aren’t all that surprising, some methods require very little effort on the student’s part. Numerous free math apps such as Photomath allow a student to take a picture of the math problem. The app scans the problem and spits out the answers, even for complex algebra problems. That means students can quickly complete the homework without actually understanding the material.

Other apps, such as HWPic , send a picture of the problem to an actual tutor, who offers a step-by-step solution to the problem. While some students may use this to better understand their homework, others just copy down the answers, complete with the steps that justify the answer.

Websites such as Cymayth and Wolfram Alpha solve math problems on the fly—Wolfram can even handle college-level math problems. While the sites and apps state they are designed to help students figure out how to do the math, they are also used by students who would rather have the answers without the effort required to think them through on their own.

Other apps quickly translate foreign languages. Rather than have to decipher what a recording says or translate written words, apps can easily translate the information for the student.

The American Academy of Pediatrics encourages parents to talk to teens about cheating and their expectations for honesty, school, and communication. Many parents may have never had a serious talk with their child about cheating. It may not even come up unless their child gets caught cheating. Some parents may not think it’s necessary to discuss because they assume their child would never cheat. 

However, clearly, the statistics show that many kids do engage in academic discretions. So, don’t assume your child wouldn’t cheat. Often, "good kids" and "honest kids" make bad decisions. Make it clear to your teen that you value hard work and honesty.

Talk to your teen regularly about the dangers of cheating. Make it clear that cheaters tend not to get ahead in life.

Discuss the academic and social consequences of cheating, too. For example, your teen might get a zero or get kicked out of a class for cheating. Even worse, other people may not believe them when they tell the truth if they become known as dishonest or a cheater. It could also go on their transcripts, which could impair their academic future.

It’s important for your teen to understand that cheating—and heavy cell phone use—can take a toll on their mental health , as well. Additionally, studies make clear that poor mental health, particularly relating to self-image, stress levels, and academic engagement, makes kids more likely to indulge in academic dishonestly. So, be sure to consider the whole picture of why your child may be cheating or feel tempted to cheat.

A 2016 study found that cheaters actually cheat themselves out of happiness. Although they may think the advantage they gain by cheating will make them happier, research shows cheating causes people to feel worse.

Establish Clear Expectations and Consequences

Deciphering what constitutes cheating in today's world can be a little tricky. If your teen uses a homework app to get help, is that cheating? What if they use a website that translates Spanish into English? Also, note that different teachers have different expectations and will allow different levels of outside academic support.

Expectations

So, you may need to take it on a case-by-case basis to determine whether your teen's use of technology enhances or hinders their learning and/or is approved by their teacher. When in doubt, you can always ask the teacher directly if using technology for homework or other projects is acceptable.

To help prevent cheating, take a firm, clear stance so that your child understands your values and expectations. Also, make sure they have any needed supports in place so that they aren't tempted to cheat due to academic frustrations or challenges.

Tell your teen, ideally before an incident of academic dishonesty occurs, that you don’t condone cheating of any kind and you’d prefer a bad grade over dishonesty.

Stay involved in your teen’s education. Know what type of homework your teen is doing and be aware of the various ways your teen may be tempted to use their laptop or smartphone to cheat.

To encourage honesty in your child, help them develop a healthy moral compass by being an honest role model. If you cheat on your taxes or lie about your teen’s age to get into the movies for a cheaper price, you may send them the message that cheating is acceptable.

Consequences

If you do catch your teen cheating, take action . Just because your teen insists, “Everyone uses an app to get homework done,” don’t blindly believe it or let that give them a free pass. Instead, reiterate your expectations and provide substantive consequences. These may include removing phone privileges for a specified period of time. Sometimes the loss of privileges —such as your teen’s electronics—for 24 hours is enough to send a clear message.

Allow your teen to face consequences at school as well. If they get a zero on a test for cheating, don’t argue with the teacher. Instead, let your teen know that cheating has serious ramifications—and that they will not get away with this behavior.

However, do find out why your teen is cheating. Consider if they're over-scheduled or afraid they can’t keep up with their peers. Are they struggling to understand the material? Do they feel unhealthy pressure to excel? Ask questions to gain an understanding so you can help prevent cheating in the future and ensure they can succeed on their own.

It’s better for your teen to learn lessons about cheating now, rather than later in life. Dishonesty can have serious consequences. Cheating in college could get your teen expelled and cheating at a future job could get them fired or it could even lead to legal action. Cheating on a future partner could lead to the end of the relationship.

A Word From Verywell

Make sure your teen knows that honesty and focusing on learning rather than only on getting "good grades," at all costs, really is the best policy. Talk about honesty often and validate your teen’s feelings when they're frustrated with schoolwork—and the fact that some students who cheat seem to get ahead without getting caught. Assure them that ultimately, people who cheat truly are cheating themselves.

Common Sense Media. It's ridiculously easy for kids to cheat now .

Common Sense Media. 35% of kids admit to using cell phones to cheat .

Isakov M, Tripathy A. Behavioral correlates of cheating: environmental specificity and reward expectation .  PLoS One . 2017;12(10):e0186054. Published 2017 Oct 26. doi:10.1371/journal.pone.0186054

Marksteiner T, Nishen AK, Dickhäuser O. Students' perception of teachers' reference norm orientation and cheating in the classroom .  Front Psychol . 2021;12:614199. doi:10.3389/fpsyg.2021.614199

Khan ZR, Sivasubramaniam S, Anand P, Hysaj A. ‘ e’-thinking teaching and assessment to uphold academic integrity: lessons learned from emergency distance learning .  International Journal for Educational Integrity . 2021;17(1):17. doi:10.1007/s40979-021-00079-5

Farnese ML, Tramontano C, Fida R, Paciello M. Cheating behaviors in academic context: does academic moral disengagement matter?   Procedia - Social and Behavioral Sciences . 2011;29:356-365. doi:10.1016/j.sbspro.2011.11.250

Pew Research Center. How parents and schools regulate teens' mobile phones .

Mohammad Abu Taleb BR, Coughlin C, Romanowski MH, Semmar Y, Hosny KH. Students, mobile devices and classrooms: a comparison of US and Arab undergraduate students in a middle eastern university .  HES . 2017;7(3):181. doi:10.5539/hes.v7n3p181

Gasparyan AY, Nurmashev B, Seksenbayev B, Trukhachev VI, Kostyukova EI, Kitas GD. Plagiarism in the context of education and evolving detection strategies .  J Korean Med Sci . 2017;32(8):1220-1227. doi:10.3346/jkms.2017.32.8.1220

Bretag T. Challenges in addressing plagiarism in education .  PLoS Med . 2013;10(12):e1001574. doi:10.1371/journal.pmed.1001574

American Academy of Pediatrics. Competition and cheating .

Korn L, Davidovitch N. The Profile of academic offenders: features of students who admit to academic dishonesty .  Med Sci Monit . 2016;22:3043-3055. doi:10.12659/msm.898810

Abi-Jaoude E, Naylor KT, Pignatiello A. Smartphones, social media use and youth mental health .  CMAJ . 2020;192(6):E136-E141. doi:10.1503/cmaj.190434

Stets JE, Trettevik R. Happiness and Identities . Soc Sci Res. 2016;58:1-13. doi:10.1016/j.ssresearch.2016.04.011

Lenhart A. Teens, Social Media & Technology Overview 2015 . Pew Research Center.

By Amy Morin, LCSW Amy Morin, LCSW, is the Editor-in-Chief of Verywell Mind. She's also a psychotherapist, an international bestselling author of books on mental strength and host of The Verywell Mind Podcast. She delivered one of the most popular TEDx talks of all time.

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Alex Green Illustration, Cheating

Why Students Cheat—and What to Do About It

A teacher seeks answers from researchers and psychologists. 

“Why did you cheat in high school?” I posed the question to a dozen former students.

“I wanted good grades and I didn’t want to work,” said Sonya, who graduates from college in June. [The students’ names in this article have been changed to protect their privacy.]

My current students were less candid than Sonya. To excuse her plagiarized Cannery Row essay, Erin, a ninth-grader with straight As, complained vaguely and unconvincingly of overwhelming stress. When he was caught copying a review of the documentary Hypernormalism , Jeremy, a senior, stood by his “hard work” and said my accusation hurt his feelings.

Cases like the much-publicized ( and enduring ) 2012 cheating scandal at high-achieving Stuyvesant High School in New York City confirm that academic dishonesty is rampant and touches even the most prestigious of schools. The data confirms this as well. A 2012 Josephson Institute’s Center for Youth Ethics report revealed that more than half of high school students admitted to cheating on a test, while 74 percent reported copying their friends’ homework. And a survey of 70,000 high school students across the United States between 2002 and 2015 found that 58 percent had plagiarized papers, while 95 percent admitted to cheating in some capacity.

So why do students cheat—and how do we stop them?

According to researchers and psychologists, the real reasons vary just as much as my students’ explanations. But educators can still learn to identify motivations for student cheating and think critically about solutions to keep even the most audacious cheaters in their classrooms from doing it again.

Rationalizing It


First, know that students realize cheating is wrong—they simply see themselves as moral in spite of it.

“They cheat just enough to maintain a self-concept as honest people. They make their behavior an exception to a general rule,” said Dr. David Rettinger , professor at the University of Mary Washington and executive director of the Center for Honor, Leadership, and Service, a campus organization dedicated to integrity.

According to Rettinger and other researchers, students who cheat can still see themselves as principled people by rationalizing cheating for reasons they see as legitimate.

Some do it when they don’t see the value of work they’re assigned, such as drill-and-kill homework assignments, or when they perceive an overemphasis on teaching content linked to high-stakes tests.

“There was no critical thinking, and teachers seemed pressured to squish it into their curriculum,” said Javier, a former student and recent liberal arts college graduate. “They questioned you on material that was never covered in class, and if you failed the test, it was progressively harder to pass the next time around.”

But students also rationalize cheating on assignments they see as having value.

High-achieving students who feel pressured to attain perfection (and Ivy League acceptances) may turn to cheating as a way to find an edge on the competition or to keep a single bad test score from sabotaging months of hard work. At Stuyvesant, for example, students and teachers identified the cutthroat environment as a factor in the rampant dishonesty that plagued the school.

And research has found that students who receive praise for being smart—as opposed to praise for effort and progress—are more inclined to exaggerate their performance and to cheat on assignments , likely because they are carrying the burden of lofty expectations.

A Developmental Stage

When it comes to risk management, adolescent students are bullish. Research has found that teenagers are biologically predisposed to be more tolerant of unknown outcomes and less bothered by stated risks than their older peers.

“In high school, they’re risk takers developmentally, and can’t see the consequences of immediate actions,” Rettinger says. “Even delayed consequences are remote to them.”

While cheating may not be a thrill ride, students already inclined to rebel against curfews and dabble in illicit substances have a certain comfort level with being reckless. They’re willing to gamble when they think they can keep up the ruse—and more inclined to believe they can get away with it.

Cheating also appears to be almost contagious among young people—and may even serve as a kind of social adhesive, at least in environments where it is widely accepted.  A study of military academy students from 1959 to 2002 revealed that students in communities where cheating is tolerated easily cave in to peer pressure, finding it harder not to cheat out of fear of losing social status if they don’t.

Michael, a former student, explained that while he didn’t need to help classmates cheat, he felt “unable to say no.” Once he started, he couldn’t stop.

A student cheats using answers on his hand.

Technology Facilitates and Normalizes It

With smartphones and Alexa at their fingertips, today’s students have easy access to quick answers and content they can reproduce for exams and papers.  Studies show that technology has made cheating in school easier, more convenient, and harder to catch than ever before.

To Liz Ruff, an English teacher at Garfield High School in Los Angeles, students’ use of social media can erode their understanding of authenticity and intellectual property. Because students are used to reposting images, repurposing memes, and watching parody videos, they “see ownership as nebulous,” she said.

As a result, while they may want to avoid penalties for plagiarism, they may not see it as wrong or even know that they’re doing it.

This confirms what Donald McCabe, a Rutgers University Business School professor,  reported in his 2012 book ; he found that more than 60 percent of surveyed students who had cheated considered digital plagiarism to be “trivial”—effectively, students believed it was not actually cheating at all.

Strategies for Reducing Cheating

Even moral students need help acting morally, said  Dr. Jason M. Stephens , who researches academic motivation and moral development in adolescents at the University of Auckland’s School of Learning, Development, and Professional Practice. According to Stephens, teachers are uniquely positioned to infuse students with a sense of responsibility and help them overcome the rationalizations that enable them to think cheating is OK.

1. Turn down the pressure cooker. Students are less likely to cheat on work in which they feel invested. A multiple-choice assessment tempts would-be cheaters, while a unique, multiphase writing project measuring competencies can make cheating much harder and less enticing. Repetitive homework assignments are also a culprit, according to research , so teachers should look at creating take-home assignments that encourage students to think critically and expand on class discussions. Teachers could also give students one free pass on a homework assignment each quarter, for example, or let them drop their lowest score on an assignment.

2. Be thoughtful about your language.   Research indicates that using the language of fixed mindsets , like praising children for being smart as opposed to praising them for effort and progress , is both demotivating and increases cheating. When delivering feedback, researchers suggest using phrases focused on effort like, “You made really great progress on this paper” or “This is excellent work, but there are still a few areas where you can grow.”

3. Create student honor councils. Give students the opportunity to enforce honor codes or write their own classroom/school bylaws through honor councils so they can develop a full understanding of how cheating affects themselves and others. At Fredericksburg Academy, high school students elect two Honor Council members per grade. These students teach the Honor Code to fifth graders, who, in turn, explain it to younger elementary school students to help establish a student-driven culture of integrity. Students also write a pledge of authenticity on every assignment. And if there is an honor code transgression, the council gathers to discuss possible consequences. 

4. Use metacognition. Research shows that metacognition, a process sometimes described as “ thinking about thinking ,” can help students process their motivations, goals, and actions. With my ninth graders, I use a centuries-old resource to discuss moral quandaries: the play Macbeth . Before they meet the infamous Thane of Glamis, they role-play as medical school applicants, soccer players, and politicians, deciding if they’d cheat, injure, or lie to achieve goals. I push students to consider the steps they take to get the outcomes they desire. Why do we tend to act in the ways we do? What will we do to get what we want? And how will doing those things change who we are? Every tragedy is about us, I say, not just, as in Macbeth’s case, about a man who succumbs to “vaulting ambition.”

5. Bring honesty right into the curriculum. Teachers can weave a discussion of ethical behavior into curriculum. Ruff and many other teachers have been inspired to teach media literacy to help students understand digital plagiarism and navigate the widespread availability of secondary sources online, using guidance from organizations like Common Sense Media .

There are complicated psychological dynamics at play when students cheat, according to experts and researchers. While enforcing rules and consequences is important, knowing what’s really motivating students to cheat can help you foster integrity in the classroom instead of just penalizing the cheating.

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Combating Academic Dishonesty, Part 1 – Understanding the Problem

by Thomas Keith | Feb 16, 2022 | Instructional design , Services

how to prevent cheating on homework

The Aims of This Series

Academic dishonesty – a term that encompasses a wide range of behaviors, from unauthorized collaboration and falsifying bibliographies to cheating on exams and buying pre-written essays – is a serious problem for higher education. Left unchecked, academic dishonesty can damage the culture of integrity that colleges and universities seek to promote, and it can even undermine the value of a degree from a given institution.

Not surprisingly, much attention has been paid to how to combat academic dishonesty. Literature on the subject, especially articles aimed at a general audience, tends to echo certain assumptions: that dishonest behavior is on the rise; that technologies such as the Internet and online learning have exacerbated the problem; and that technological tools for surveillance, such as online proctoring software or plagiarism checkers, are vital if the problem is to be curbed.

In this blog series, we will examine – and challenge – these assumptions. In the first installment, we will explore the scholarly literature to consider whether academic dishonesty is truly a growing problem and what its causes are. Subsequent installments will present strategies for promoting academic integrity in the classroom, with a focus on technology. We will consider what technology can do, and (just as importantly) what it cannot do, to prevent academic dishonesty.

Is the Problem Getting Worse?

Many media narratives take for granted that academic dishonesty – usually referred to by the popular term “cheating” – is worse today than it has ever been. Explanations for this include the easy availability of information on the Internet; the ubiquity of cell phones, which make sending and receiving messages easy; and, more broadly, a moral decline in society, with students taking an instrumentalist view of their education: grades are all that matter, and any method of securing a good grade is legitimate.

Going hand in hand with this narrative is a valorization of the notion of “control”. Bluntly put, if students are given the opportunity to cheat (so the thinking runs) they invariably will cheat. Thus, the key to academic integrity is hemming students in with controls that deprive them of any opportunity to behave dishonestly. Take away their laptops and cell phones; proctor them closely, whether in-person or online; check their work against databases of previous student work to find possible plagiarism; and so forth.

The COVID-19 pandemic has proven to be something of a laboratory for testing these claims. In the early days of the pandemic, when most colleges and universities made an emergency shift to remote instruction, there was an astronomical jump (nearly 200%) in questions submitted to the controversial “homework help” website Chegg (Redden 2021). Such data appeared to confirm widespread fears that students were taking advantage of the online environment to behave dishonestly. Deprived of the ability to proctor exams in-person, many institutions that had not previously used an online proctoring solution raced to adopt one (Flaherty 2020).  Their decision found support in scholarly literature that argued proctoring is necessary, as students are more likely to consider cheating acceptable when an exam is unproctored (Dyer, Pettyjohn, and Saladin 2020). The University of Chicago itself set up an agreement with the online proctoring service Proctorio , although Academic Technology Solutions did not encourage its use.

This approach, however, has not been without pushback. Advocates of “compassionate pedagogy,” such as Jesse Stommel in his keynote at the 2021 Symposium for Teaching with Technology , have pointed out that claims of rampant cheating are often based on emotion rather than evidence. Furthermore, in the unprecedented and nightmarish circumstances of the pandemic, students reaching out for help wherever they can find it should not be taken as evidence of a moral collapse, but rather as an understandable coping strategy.

There is also empirical evidence that problematizes the narrative of skyrocketing academic dishonesty. Donald McCabe and Linda Trevino, in a longitudinal study, found that the percentage of students self-reporting dishonest behavior remained fairly constant between 1963 and 1993 (McCabe and Trevino 1996). Admittedly, this study predated the Internet and other technologies that may enable academic dishonesty, and it did find that certain types of cheating (notably unauthorized collaboration, which we will delve into in greater detail in future installments) were on the rise; nonetheless, it remains suggestive.

On a more fundamental level, though, it is worth considering why students may commit acts of academic dishonesty. If we look beyond a straightforward narrative of moral decline, we see that there are contextual factors that can make academic dishonesty more or less likely; most of these factors are not new, but they have long shaped the classroom environment. This discovery has important implications for our attitude toward technology. It can be argued (and, in subsequent installments, will be argued) that while technology does have a role to play in helping to promote academic integrity, no tool or piece of software is a panacea. Furthermore, we will show that many of the most important steps faculty and administrators can take to combat academic dishonesty have nothing to do with technology and everything to do with thoughtful, compassionate pedagogy.

Why Do Students Cheat?

There is, of course, no one answer to why students may choose to engage in academically dishonest behaviors. Empirical research, however, has identified certain factors that increase the likelihood of academic dishonesty. Some of these are personal; others are contextual. Our focus here will be on the latter, inasmuch as the individual faculty member or administrator has more control over them.

It has been shown repeatedly that peer attitudes and behavior are vital. If students perceive that their peers consider academic dishonesty acceptable, they are significantly more likely to behave dishonestly themselves (McCabe and Trevino 1997). Conversely, when a college or university has a strong culture of integrity – for example, an honor code that spells out student privileges and obligations – peer pressure can be a positive force, discouraging students from behaving dishonestly (McCabe, Trevino, and Butterfield 1999).

Problems of understanding what, in fact, academic dishonesty is can also lead to trouble. Many students come out of high school with a weak, if not nonexistent, understanding of such basic academic notions as how to cite sources properly. They may consider some academically dishonest behaviors as perfectly acceptable that faculty and administrators would condemn (Nelson, Nelson, and Tichenor 2013). Cultural differences can further cloud the picture. If a student is a non-native English speaker, for instance, he or she may struggle to understand the very concept of plagiarism – which, it must be borne in mind, is based upon a distinctly Western understanding of proper source usage (Click 2012).

Finally, the classroom environment itself is a powerful factor in shaping student attitudes. Student engagement is vital: if students feel that they are receiving personal attention and that the tasks their instructor assigns are meaningful, they are less likely to behave dishonestly. Conversely, if they feel a sense of alienation or “depersonalization,” or if they believe they are merely being given “busy work” with no pedagogical worth, the chances of their behaving dishonestly increase markedly (Pulvers and Diekhoff 1999). This danger is particularly acute in very large classes and in classes held online. The more a student feels that he or she is just a number (or a grade), the less restraint he or she is likely to feel about violating norms of conduct.

These conclusions will shape our analysis going forward. In Part 2, “Small Steps to Discourage Academic Dishonesty,” we will look at immediate, short-term steps that faculty and instructors can take to make academic dishonesty less likely. In Part 3, “Towards a Pedagogy of Academic Integrity,” we will step back and introduce broader pedagogical considerations, which require more time and effort to implement but which are also likely to have greater impact overall in reducing dishonest behavior.

Works Cited

Click, Amanda. “Issues of Plagiarism and Academic Integrity for Second-Language Students.” MELA Notes no. 85 (2012), pp. 44-53. https://www.jstor.org/stable/23392491

Dyer, Jarrett A., Heidi C. Pettyjohn, and Steve Saladin. “Academic Dishonesty and Testing: How Student Beliefs and Test Settings Impact Decisions to Cheat”. Journal of the National College Testing Association vol. 4 issue 1 (2020), pp. 1-30. https://www.ncta-testing.org/assets/docs/JNCTA/2020%20-%20JNCTA%20-%20Academic%20Dishonesty%20and%20Testing.pdf

Flaherty, Colleen. Online proctoring is surging during COVID-19 ( Inside Higher Ed , May 11, 2020)

McCabe, Donald L., and Linda Klebe Trevino. “What We Know about Cheating in College: Longitudinal Trends and Recent Developments.” Change vol. 28 no. 1 (Jan.-Feb. 1996), pp. 28-33. https://www.jstor.org/stable/40177789

McCabe, Donald L., and Linda Klebe Trevino. “Individual and Contextual Influences on Academic Dishonesty: A Multicampus Investigation.” Research in Higher Education vol. 38 no. 3  (Jun. 1997), pp. 379-396. https://www.jstor.org/stable/40196302

McCabe, Donald L., Linda Klebe Trevino, and Kenneth D. Butterfield. “Academic Integrity in Honor Code and Non-Honor Code Environments: A Qualitative Investigation.” Journal of Higher Education vol. 70 no. 2 (Mar.-Apr. 1999), pp. 211-234. https://www.jstor.org/stable/2649128

Nelson, Lynda P., Rodney K. Nelson, and Linda Tichenor. “Understanding Today’s Students: Entry-Level Science Student Involvement in Academic Dishonesty.” Journal of College Science Teaching vol. 42 no. 3 (Jan./Feb. 2013), pp. 52-57. https://www.jstor.org/stable/43631795

Pulvers, Kim, and George M. Diekhoff. “The Relationship between Academic Dishonesty and College Classroom Environment.” Research in Higher Education vol. 40 no. 4 (Aug. 1999), pp. 487-498. https://www.jstor.org/stable/40196358

Redden, Elizabeth. Study finds nearly 200 percent jump in questions submitted to Chegg after start of pandemic ( Inside Higher Ed , Feb. 5, 2021)

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September 28, 2020 Teaching & Learning

How to avoid online cheating & encourage learning instead.

Students tempted to find easy answers while distance learning

By Sherry Posnick-Goodwin

Joline Martinez suspected many of her students were cheating after her school closed last spring and she transitioned to distance learning. They showed their work on equations and came up with the correct answers, but something was definitely off, says the Yosemite High School math teacher.

Face of Joline Martinez

Joline Martinez

“My students were solving problems with ridiculous fractions,” says Martinez, a member of Yosemite Unified Teachers Association. “They were using steps they had never been taught. It was a huge issue. I suspected they were cheating. I was losing sleep over this.”

Martinez was so frustrated, she posted about it on CTA’s “Teaching, Learning and Life During COVID-19” Facebook page, and found she was not alone. Numerous CTA members responded to her post, saying they also suspected students were cheating while working from home.

One of them, Maggie Strode, was troubled that students who were struggling when attending school on campus were suddenly turning in perfect papers during distance learning.

“Students were combining several steps into one while solving equations, and always moved the variable to the left side of the equation,” says Strode, a math teacher at South Hills High School and member of the Covina Unified Education Association. “It’s something I do not have my students do, because when they are doing the equations on their own, it leads to errors.” During online office hours she asked them to solve similar problems, and they didn’t have a clue.

Both teachers figured out their students were using Photomath, an app that utilizes a cellphone’s camera to recognize mathematical equations and display a step-by-step solution onscreen — which may differ from how students were taught.

“It’s frustrating,” says Strode. “I was creating videos showing students how to do the work, but they weren’t watching them. Instead, they used this app. It’s much easier to keep an eye on students when you have them in your classroom. When they work from home, it is much more challenging.”

“I gave them the opportunity to resubmit. Students were going through a lot, and I wanted to demonstrate compassion.” — Karin Prasad, Liberty Education Association

Students are more tempted with distance learning

When schools closed abruptly last March due to COVID-19, older students knew that their grades couldn’t be lowered, only raised. Nonetheless, many cheated while working from home, even those with passing grades, say teachers.

Educators admit they were so overwhelmed with transitioning to distance learning that it was difficult to police students who were intent on beating the system. Students can Google answers instantly on their phones during exams and watch videos about how to cheat on YouTube. (Some colleges are having students install a second camera on their devices and clearing their workspace, so that instructors can see students’ hands during exam time.)

Face of Karin Prasad

Karin Prasad

Distance learning has created more temptations for students, observes Karin Prasad, an English teacher at Heritage High School in Brentwood. She uses turnitin.com , an online program that compares her students’ work with other student essays in the system and also published work. After schools closed due to the pandemic, two essays were red-flagged in what’s called a “similarity report.”

Normally she would have given both students a zero on the assignment. But Prasad gave them some leeway because of the state of the world.

“Being in a pandemic is weird and scary,” says the Liberty Education Association member. “So instead of giving them a zero, which I would have done in a normal school year, I gave them the opportunity to resubmit. Students were going through a lot, and I wanted to demonstrate compassion.”

Martinez also didn’t make a big fuss the way she would have under normal circumstances. “I didn’t really push the issue. I didn’t want to have to contact all of the parents; I have 200 students in my classes. It was definitely an uphill battle.”

This year will be different, vows Martinez, whose district will begin the year online. Students will be held accountable for work done from home, and the no-cheating rule will be strictly enforced.

“I give timed quizzes, where they only have a short time for each question — and no time to look it up.” — Pedro Quintanilla, Imperial Valley Teachers Association
  • How teachers can put the kibosh on cheating

“If you can Google the answer to a question, it’s not worth asking,” says Katie Hollman, a seventh grade math teacher at Walter Stiern Middle School in Bakersfield. “Students immediately jump on Google to hunt for answers in class by opening a second tab on their computer, so you can just imagine what happens at home on cellphones.”

Hollman, a member of the Bakersfield Elementary Teachers Association, asks students to explain their work on Flipgrid videos they create. She also has students create their own real-world math word problems, and then solve them. It might involve visiting a restaurant and explaining the bill, deciding how much they want to tip, adding the tax, and figuring out percentages, for example. Or going to various grocery stores and comparing the unit rates of various items for sale to discern which is a better bargain. Because students are mostly at home, the research for menu and grocery store items happens online, of course.

Face of Pedro Quintanilla

Pedro Quintanilla

Imperial High School teacher Pedro Quintanilla can tell if students are cheating on exams while solving math problems with paper and pencil, by looking at handwriting when assignments are submitted online. If the work seems too perfect, without pressure points in some spots and nothing crossed out or erased, he becomes suspicious.

“If you don’t see any struggle, that is a big sign,” says Quintanilla, an Imperial Valley Teachers Association member.

“One of the ways I assess knowledge of major concepts is by giving a timed quiz, and have them submit their answers to each question, one at a time, almost immediately. Also, I include a Quizzizz activity [a fast-paced, interactive game] where they need to perform the skills learned in a lesson. In addition, no pun intended, I have them submit their notes for a lesson. And I give timed quizzes, where they only have a short time for each question — and no time to look it up.”

Face of Suzie Priebe

Suzie Priebe

Suzie Priebe, a history teacher at Amelia Earhart Middle School, asks students to write about things they are knowledgeable about on the first day of class so she can hear their “voice” and get a “flavor” of how they write. She compares their tone to essay questions later, to determine authenticity.

She also asks them interpretive questions on history, such as “What do you think is the most important thing about the Bill of Rights and why?”

“In history, it’s not as important to memorize, because you look up things on Google, such as when the Declaration of Independence was signed. But knowing why it was signed and being able to explain that is just better.”

Other ideas to prevent cheating online:

  • Mix it up , with tests having a variety of multiple-choice, true/false and open-ended questions. It’s more difficult for students to share answers when they must explain concepts.
  • Have every student start the exam at the same time and set a time limit. The key is having enough time for students who know the information to respond, but not enough time for students who don’t know the material to search online for answers.
  • Only show one question at a time , so students can’t be searching ahead on Google.
  • Change test question sequence , so that all students do not have the same question at one time, to avoid screen sharing.
  • Give students different versions of the same test to thwart screen sharing.
  • Give students their scores all at the same time , so that students who finish early don’t confirm answers for those still working.
  • Increase points for class participation .
  • Talk about integrity , and have students sign an “academic integrity” agreement.
“I want my students to be successful. If they rely on shortcuts and cheat, they won’t survive in the real world.” —Maggie Strode, Covina Unified Education Association

Encourage students to be honest

Talking to students about integrity, trust and doing the right thing also prevents cheating.

Face of Maggie Strode

Maggie Strode

“I let my students know that once you are labeled a cheat, it’s very hard to regain trust,” says Strode. “I tell students I’d rather they not turn in an assignment than turn in work they didn’t do. They don’t realize that they sometimes put more time and effort into cheating than it would take to just do the assignment. I love my students. I want them to be successful — not only in my classroom, but in life. If they rely on shortcuts and cheat, they won’t survive in the real world. No one will make allowances for them there.”

Hollman discusses cheating in her weekly “Life Lessons with Hollman” sessions, urging students to resist the temptation and instead ask for help.

Face of Katie Hollman

Katie Hollman

“I want to help them understand the material so we can fix the problem. I make time for tutoring during online office hours. And I explain that if they cheat in college, they won’t just get a zero on an assignment — they will get kicked out of school.”

She also explains that it’s in their own best interest: If enough students cheat, the teacher assumes the class has mastered the material, and makes the curriculum even more challenging.

Quintanilla talks to his students about the importance of digital citizenship and the value of the honor system in his classes.

“With distance learning, you have to establish a good relationship with students, and then, when you emphasize honesty, you have more buy-in from them.”

“I would rather see the child attempt something, fail, and ask for help, rather than not try.”

Distance Learning: Parents Doing Children’s Work?

Even in normal times, second grade teacher Nailah Legohn has seen the lines blur between parental support and parents doing the homework, so their children don’t fall behind. But with distance learning, parents and sometimes older siblings are doing schoolwork of children more frequently.

Face of Nailah Legohn

Nailah Legohn

“Sometimes it’s hard to know who is really doing the work,” says Legohn, a teacher at Ridgemoor Elementary School in Sun City. “The little ones need a lot of parent support. And they may be saying, ‘I don’t get it.’ If they whine and cry enough, the parent may give in and provide the answer because they want the child to get credit — or they want their child to go outside and play. Parents are under so much pressure. Many of them are also working at home while trying to help their children.”

Parents think they are helping, but they are not, says Legohn, a member of the Menifee Teachers Association. “I tell them, ‘Please don’t do the work for them.’ I explain that they are not setting up their child for success. If kids know that someone else is going to provide the answer, they will expect that to happen when they go back into the regular classroom. And that’s not how it’s going to be. When schools reopen, students are going to have to do the work themselves. If they aren’t used to it, it will be much more of a struggle.”

Legohn asks her students to circle problems that are difficult for them, and then she helps students understand the material by offering extra help during virtual office hours. They can also message her on Google Classroom to ask questions.

“I want my students to love learning and understand how to learn,” says Legohn. “I am pushing for them to have a growth mindset and the ability to ask questions. I would rather see the child attempt something, fail, and ask for help, rather than not try. Parents are role models, and the best way they can help is teaching their children to take responsibility for their own learning.”

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Why Do Students Cheat?

  • Posted July 19, 2016
  • By Zachary Goldman

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In March, Usable Knowledge published an article on ethical collaboration , which explored researchers’ ideas about how to develop classrooms and schools where collaboration is nurtured but cheating is avoided. The piece offers several explanations for why students cheat and provides powerful ideas about how to create ethical communities. The article left me wondering how students themselves might respond to these ideas, and whether their experiences with cheating reflected the researchers’ understanding. In other words, how are young people “reading the world,” to quote Paulo Freire , when it comes to questions of cheating, and what might we learn from their perspectives?

I worked with Gretchen Brion-Meisels to investigate these questions by talking to two classrooms of students from Massachusetts and Texas about their experiences with cheating. We asked these youth informants to connect their own insights and ideas about cheating with the ideas described in " Ethical Collaboration ." They wrote from a range of perspectives, grappling with what constitutes cheating, why people cheat, how people cheat, and when cheating might be ethically acceptable. In doing so, they provide us with additional insights into why students cheat and how schools might better foster ethical collaboration.

Why Students Cheat

Students critiqued both the individual decision-making of peers and the school-based structures that encourage cheating. For example, Julio (Massachusetts) wrote, “Teachers care about cheating because its not fair [that] students get good grades [but] didn't follow the teacher's rules.” His perspective represents one set of ideas that we heard, which suggests that cheating is an unethical decision caused by personal misjudgment. Umna (Massachusetts) echoed this idea, noting that “cheating is … not using the evidence in your head and only using the evidence that’s from someone else’s head.”

Other students focused on external factors that might make their peers feel pressured to cheat. For example, Michima (Massachusetts) wrote, “Peer pressure makes students cheat. Sometimes they have a reason to cheat like feeling [like] they need to be the smartest kid in class.” Kayla (Massachusetts) agreed, noting, “Some people cheat because they want to seem cooler than their friends or try to impress their friends. Students cheat because they think if they cheat all the time they’re going to get smarter.” In addition to pressure from peers, students spoke about pressure from adults, pressure related to standardized testing, and the demands of competing responsibilities.

When Cheating is Acceptable

Students noted a few types of extenuating circumstances, including high stakes moments. For example, Alejandra (Texas) wrote, “The times I had cheated [were] when I was failing a class, and if I failed the final I would repeat the class. And I hated that class and I didn’t want to retake it again.” Here, she identifies allegiance to a parallel ethical value: Graduating from high school. In this case, while cheating might be wrong, it is an acceptable means to a higher-level goal.

Encouraging an Ethical School Community

Several of the older students with whom we spoke were able to offer us ideas about how schools might create more ethical communities. Sam (Texas) wrote, “A school where cheating isn't necessary would be centered around individualization and learning. Students would learn information and be tested on the information. From there the teachers would assess students' progress with this information, new material would be created to help individual students with what they don't understand. This way of teaching wouldn't be based on time crunching every lesson, but more about helping a student understand a concept.”

Sam provides a vision for the type of school climate in which collaboration, not cheating, would be most encouraged. Kaith (Texas), added to this vision, writing, “In my own opinion students wouldn’t find the need to cheat if they knew that they had the right undivided attention towards them from their teachers and actually showed them that they care about their learning. So a school where cheating wasn’t necessary would be amazing for both teachers and students because teachers would be actually getting new things into our brains and us as students would be not only attentive of our teachers but also in fact learning.”

Both of these visions echo a big idea from “ Ethical Collaboration ”: The importance of reducing the pressure to achieve. Across students’ comments, we heard about how self-imposed pressure, peer pressure, and pressure from adults can encourage cheating.

Where Student Opinions Diverge from Research

The ways in which students spoke about support differed from the descriptions in “ Ethical Collaboration .” The researchers explain that, to reduce cheating, students need “vertical support,” or standards, guidelines, and models of ethical behavior. This implies that students need support understanding what is ethical. However, our youth informants describe a type of vertical support that centers on listening and responding to students’ needs. They want teachers to enable ethical behavior through holistic support of individual learning styles and goals. Similarly, researchers describe “horizontal support” as creating “a school environment where students know, and can persuade their peers, that no one benefits from cheating,” again implying that students need help understanding the ethics of cheating. Our youth informants led us to believe instead that the type of horizontal support needed may be one where collective success is seen as more important than individual competition.

Why Youth Voices Matter, and How to Help Them Be Heard

Our purpose in reaching out to youth respondents was to better understand whether the research perspectives on cheating offered in “ Ethical Collaboration ” mirrored the lived experiences of young people. This blog post is only a small step in that direction; young peoples’ perspectives vary widely across geographic, demographic, developmental, and contextual dimensions, and we do not mean to imply that these youth informants speak for all youth. However, our brief conversations suggest that asking youth about their lived experiences can benefit the way that educators understand school structures.

Too often, though, students are cut out of conversations about school policies and culture. They rarely even have access to information on current educational research, partially because they are not the intended audience of such work. To expand opportunities for student voice, we need to create spaces — either online or in schools — where students can research a current topic that interests them. Then they can collect information, craft arguments they want to make, and deliver their messages. Educators can create the spaces for this youth-driven work in schools, communities, and even policy settings — helping to support young people as both knowledge creators and knowledge consumers. 

Additional Resources

  • Read “ Student Voice in Educational Research and Reform ” [PDF] by Alison Cook-Sather.
  • Read “ The Significance of Students ” [PDF] by Dana L. Mitra.
  • Read “ Beyond School Spirit ” by Emily J. Ozer and Dana Wright.

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17 Tips to Help You Stop Students from Cheating

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It’s no secret that cheating is a rampant problem in academic institutions. But what can be done to stop students from cheating in the classroom? There are a number of strategies that teachers can utilize to discourage cheating and help maintain academic integrity. 

One way to reduce cheating is to create an environment that does not condone it. Teachers should make it clear that cheating is unacceptable and will not be tolerated. They should also enforce disciplinary actions for students who cheat, such as failing the assignment or receiving a lower grade. 

Furthermore, teachers can use effective teaching methods that promote critical thinking and discourage rote memorization. This type of instruction makes it more difficult for students to cheat because they are required to think for themselves and understand the material.

Moreover, teachers can randomly test students on material covered in class in order to ensure that they are actually learning the information.

Types of Cheating

There are three types of cheating in class: plagiarism, collusion, and fabrication. Plagiarism is when a student copies someone else’s work and tries to pass it off as their own. Collusion is when students work together on an assignment that is supposed to be done alone. Fabrication is when a student makes up information for an assignment. 

All of these types of cheating can lead to serious consequences, such as getting kicked out of school or getting a low grade on an assignment. It’s important for teachers to know about these types of cheating and how to avoid them.

All of these forms of cheating can have a negative impact on the student and the classroom environment and should be avoided at all costs. However, the good news is that there are ways to stop students from cheating, and it starts with prevention.

Signs of Cheating

Cheating in school can be a big problem, not only for the individual who is cheating but also for the rest of the class. Cheating can take many different forms, from copying work from classmates to taking unacceptable materials into class during a test. 

It can be difficult to determine whether or not a student is cheating in class. However, there are some warning signs that can help you identify whether someone is cheating in your class.

One sign that cheating is happening is if students are constantly getting up to use the restroom or get drinks of water. This may be an attempt to get away from the test materials or to copy someone else’s work. 

Another sign that cheating might be going on is if students are behaving oddly when they should be taking the test. For example, they may be whispering to each other or trying to cover their answers. 

If you suspect that cheating is happening in your class, there are a few things you can do to stop it. One thing you can do is make sure all students have a clear view of the test materials and monitor them closely. Another option is to talk with them about it and see if they’re willing to stop.

Methods of Cheating

There are many methods of cheating that students use to get an edge in class. Some methods are more obvious, such as copying someone else’s work, while others are more subtle, such as using a cell phone to look up answers. Regardless of the method, cheating can have serious consequences for both the student and the school.

One of the most common methods of cheating students use is copying someone else’s work. Students do this by sharing answers during a test or by simply copying someone else’s homework. 

Another common method of cheating students use in class is using a cell phone to look up answers. This is done by searching for answers online or by texting friends for help.

All these methods of cheating can be prevented by making sure you have a clear and concise policy in place for cheating and making sure you enforce it. Also, be sure to put systems in place to track and report cheating activities. Finally, make sure you have a discipline system in place for those who cheat.

Reasons why students cheat in class

One of the most pressing issues in today’s education system is cheating. Students have found various ways to cheat in order to get ahead, and this has become a huge problem in schools. Cheating can take many different forms, from copying another student’s homework to plagiarizing content from the internet. In some cases, students even pay others to do their work for them. 

So why do students cheat in the classroom? There are many reasons why students might feel the need to cheat.

1. One reason is that they may feel pressured to get good grades in order to get into college or to keep their scholarships.

2. Some students may also feel like they are behind in the class and need to cheat in order to catch up.

3. Some students may also believe that cheating is not really wrong, or that they won’t get caught.

4. Another reason is that they may feel like they are not good at test-taking and feel like they have to cheat in order to get a good grade. 

5. Lastly, some students may feel like cheating is the only way to keep up with the other students in the class.

No matter what the reason, it is important for teachers to find ways to stop students from cheating in class. One way to do this is by reinforcing that cheating is not tolerated and will have consequences.

Teachers can also create an environment where students feel comfortable asking for help when they don’t understand something. This will help reduce the temptation to cheat. Moreover, teachers can create rules and policies related to cheating and make sure all students are aware of these rules.

How to Address Cheating

When it comes to cheating in the classroom, prevention is key. There are a few things teachers can do to help stop students from cheating in class. 

When you see a student cheating in class, it can be difficult to know what to do. You may be tempted to confront the student, but that may not be the best approach. Here are four steps to take if you catch a student cheating:

1. The first thing you should do is call out the student. This will let them know that you are aware of what they are doing and that it is not allowed. You may also want to take away their phone or other electronic devices so they can’t cheat anymore.

2. If a student cheats in class, you may want to speak to them privately after class or send them to the principal’s office. Depending on the severity of the situation, the school may decide to give the student punishment or even expel them.

3. If a student has cheated on a test or assignment, you may want to consider marking them down or giving them a low score. This will help them learn that cheating is not an effective way to get ahead in school and may discourage them from doing it again. 

4. Finally, teachers can address cheating by setting clear expectations for students regarding what is and is not allowed. Make sure that all students know what is expected of them in terms of academic honesty, and be sure to enforce these rules consistently.

17 Tips to Prevent Cheating

1. create a code of conduct.

Creating a code of conduct is one of the most important steps you can take to prevent cheating. Having a set of rules that everyone knows and follows will help keep the classroom clean and organized.

2. Use maximum discipline.

If you want to stop students from cheating, you need to enforce maximum discipline. This means taking away privileges such as recess if students are caught cheating.

3. Encourage open discussion.

Encouraging open discussion is one of the best ways to prevent cheating. This means that you must allow students to share their ideas and thoughts with you, without fear of reprisal.

4. Use positive reinforcement.

One of the best ways to prevent cheating is to use positive reinforcement. This means rewarding students for good behavior and punishing them for bad behavior.

5. Monitor students’ behavior.

One of the best ways to prevent cheating is to monitor student behavior. This means keeping track of what students are doing in the classroom and then taking appropriate action if necessary.

6. Make it hard to cheat.

One of the best ways to stop students from cheating is to make it hard for them to cheat. This means setting up rules that are difficult to follow and punishing students who cheat.

7. Get Rid Of Unwanted Materials.

If you find that students are using cheating schemes more often, it may be because they are using unwanted materials. Remove any unauthorized materials from the classroom and see if that prevents cheating.

8. Talking To Your Students About Cheating.

Talk to your students about cheating. This will help them understand why it is wrong and will help prevent them from cheating in the future.

9. Use seating charts.

In order to ensure that classroom activities are conducted fairly and without cheating, it is important to establish clear boundaries between students and to enforce proper seating arrangements. A good way to do this is by using a seating chart.

By clearly marking out the areas where students are supposed to sit, you can make it more difficult for them to communicate with each other illicitly. Additionally, by having everyone sit in the same place at all times, you can help prevent any attempts at cheating.

10. Have students take tests in separate rooms.

Having students take tests in separate rooms can help ensure that they are not sharing information about the questions with each other. Providing them with specific instructions on how to answer the questions can also help ensure that they are not able to cheat by looking at other people’s answers. Finally, monitoring their progress during and after the test can help ensure that they do not have time to cheat on it.

11. Check students’ work often.

One way to prevent cheating is to check students’ work often. This includes looking at the work themselves as well as having others check it for mistakes. It is also important to have a system in place for dealing with suspected cheating, such as reporting it to the principal.

12. Teach Values ​That Include Integrity.

Teach values that include integrity in your classroom. This will help your students to see the importance of honesty and may help to prevent cheating in the future.

13. Encourage student participation.

Encourage student participation by providing incentives for good behavior. This will help to motivate students to do their best and may help to prevent cheating.

14. Create a Safe and Enjoyable Learning Environment.

Cheating will not occur if the learning environment is safe and enjoyable . Make sure your classroom is clean and organized, and provide positive reinforcement for good behavior.

15. Teach Discipline Respectfully.

Discipline is an important part of any classroom, but it should be taught with respect. Use proper vocabulary, tone, and body language when disciplining your students.

16. Establish a Respectful Relationship With Your Students.

One of the best ways to stop cheating is to establish a respectful relationship with your students. If you are able to build a good rapport with your students, they may be more hesitant to cheat.

17. Assign Homework.

One of the best ways to prevent cheating is to assign homework. This will help keep students focused and engaged in the class, reducing the chances that they will cheat.

The Importance of Preventing Students from Cheating

There are many reasons why preventing students from cheating in class is important. One of the most important reasons is that it can help ensure that all students have an equal opportunity to learn. When some students are able to cheat without consequence, it puts those who don’t cheat at a disadvantage. In addition, cheating can also lead to unfairness in the grading process.

Another reason why preventing students from cheating is important is that it can help maintain the integrity of the academic system. Cheating can impact both individual students and the overall institution. When large numbers of students are found to be cheating, it can cast doubt on the validity of all of the school’s degrees and programs.

Moreover, another benefit of preventing cheating is that it can help improve academic performance. When students know that they will be caught if they cheat, they are less likely to do so. This can lead to more honest work and better grades for all students involved.

Furthermore, preventing cheating can also help create a more positive learning environment. When everyone is following the same rules and expectations, it makes for a more respectful and organized class.

In addition, preventing cheating can help build a stronger sense of community in the classroom. When everyone is working together honestly, it creates a positive atmosphere in which everyone feels respected and valued. This can help encourage cooperation and collaboration among students, as well as better relationships between classmates.

Also, preventing students from cheating can lead to a high level of confidence in one’s own abilities.

Ultimately, preventing students from cheating in class is important because it helps ensure that everyone plays by the same rules and gets a fair shot at success.

Final Thoughts

In conclusion, there are many ways to prevent cheating in class. By using a variety of methods, teachers can help create an environment where cheating is less likely to occur. Teachers should be proactive in preventing cheating and be sure to communicate with their students about what is and is not allowed in order to maintain a fair and honest learning environment.

There are many benefits to preventing students from cheating in class. The first is that it helps ensure that all students are held to the same standards. If some students are able to cheat and get away with it, they are getting an unfair advantage over their classmates. This can also create a level of dishonesty and distrust in the classroom. Thank You for Your Time!

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Classroom Management | Teaching Strategies

11 Ways to Prevent Cheating in Schools

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May 10th, 2022 | 9 min. read

11 Ways to Prevent Cheating in Schools

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In working with teachers for more than 30 years, one of the most common frustrations we hear across the board is the fact that students cheat to get ahead .

Unfortunately, this isn’t a recent problem. Academic dishonesty has been around since before anyone can remember. But why do students cheat? Do they dislike the topics? Is the pressure to get good grades too much? Are they looked down on for asking for help?

Even though this is a problem with seemingly no solution in sight, we’ve got some ideas to help you make some changes in your school.

In this article, you'll discover 11 strategies to help prevent cheating in the classroom , as well as a quick video on how to prevent cheating within AES. 

By the end of this article, you'll be well on your way to making your classroom as honest as it can be. 

Video: Strategies to Reduce Cheating in Your Classes

If you use the AES curriculum system, watch this video for a quick overview on using features inside and outside of the AES system to prevent cheating. 

how to prevent cheating on homework

1. Talk About Honesty & Integrity

students-cheating-honesty-integrity

Discussing honesty and integrity is a great starting point for any teacher who has concerns about cheating in the classroom.

Even though your students may have already learned these concepts, it’s a good idea to discuss them in relation to your class specifically.

This may not sound like it will prevent cheating by itself, but it’s at least a good reminder of academic integrity.

Plus, if you’re upfront about your expectations, that could be all that some students need to hear to think twice before cheating.

2. Teach Digital Responsibility

students-cheating-digital-responsibility

In today’s educational world, many teachers use digital resources in their classroom.

While it’s incredibly useful, this technology can sometimes make it easier for sneaky students to cheat on assignments both in class and at home.

To cover your bases, it’s smart to spend at least one class period discussing digital responsibility.

This will help you teach students about the importance of honesty, integrity, and decision-making using online tools.

By explaining the responsibilities your students have to make good decisions (including not cheating), you’re reinforcing classroom expectations.

3. Create an Anti-Cheating Pledge

students-cheating-anti-cheating-pledge

Some teachers find another way to reinforce integrity and honesty is to create an Anti-Cheating Pledge.

Essentially, this pledge will define your classes rules related to cheating and academic honesty. It should be cut-and-dry to prevent anyone from trying to find a loophole when caught cheating.

You can create your own document or use a pre-generated one, but some teachers find more success when students are involved in creating the pledge themselves!

Afterall, if students collectively come up with the rules related to cheating, they’ll hold each other accountable for not breaking them.

(This is one of the times you’ll see peer pressure work in a positive way!)

After finalizing the details, have each student sign the pledge and agree to uphold everything included.

To make the anti-cheating pledge front and center, you could even turn it into a poster to hang on your classroom wall.

This poster will act as a constant reminder to any student in your class that they’ve singed the pledge and are expected to uphold it!

4. Make Different Versions of Your Assessments

students-cheating-assessment-versions

To combat cheating on tests specifically, you can make multiple versions of the same assessment.

Whether it’s a paper test or online assessment, you have a lot of options for doing this.

Many teachers create two or three versions of the same test with the questions in a different order on each version.

In other cases, teachers will reword questions on each version.

Once you’ve created the different versions, you’ve got another decision to make.

Some teachers don’t tell their students they’ve created different versions.

This can help you spot students who’ve copied someone else’s answers because the cheating student will have incorrect answers for their test, but the correct ones for the other version!

Other teachers will choose to tell their students they’ve made multiple versions of the test.

They do this because sometimes being upfront with this information, it will discourage students from trying to cheat in the first place!

5. Switch Up Seating on Test Day

students-cheating-seating

In some classrooms, students who sit together may plan to cheat off of each other’s tests.

If this is a problem in your classes, you can switch seating in your classroom every test day.

On test day, assign students to sit in a different place than their normal seat. You can decide where each student will sit and make sure students who tend to cheat are placed away from each other.

Most teachers won’t tell students about the seating changes, in case students still try to make plans to cheat.

If you’ve got one or two stubborn students who try to game the system, they’ll likely bother everyone else in the class to try and cheat.

In turn, there’s bound to be a student who tells you what’s going on and you can implement one of the other strategies on the list to prevent avid cheaters.

6. Use Multiple Assessment Styles

students-cheating-formative-summative

In education, quizzes and tests can be either formative or summative assessments .

Formative assessments evaluate how well a student is learning the material through the course.

Summative assessments measure how much a student learned during the course.

Essentially, that means formative assessments can occur at any point in time and summative assessments are performed at the end of a unit or class.

Teachers usually emphasize summative assessments like final exams or end-of-course reports when they determine final grades. In turn, that means students have more incentive to cheat on those types of assessments!

To take the pressure off and reduce the urge to cheat, try incorporating a more even balance of formative and summative assessments in how you give grades to your students.

7. Manage Access to Personal Devices

students-cheating-cellphones

Regardless of whether your students actively cheat in the classroom, it’s a good idea to make rules about cellphones and other devices during testing.

Some teachers instruct all students to place their phones on their desks facedown so the teacher can see where they are.

Other teachers create a designated area (such as a drawer or basket) where students must place their phones when they enter the classroom.

You could even make this a benefit to your students by turning it into a “ charging station ” for students to plug their phones in during the day.

Even with these types of policies in place, some students will try to sneak their phone past you.

If this becomes a problem, you could may need to confiscate phones you see out during the test.

8. Check the Settings on Digital Study Tools

students-cheating-digital-tools

Sometimes, sneaky students figure out ways to turn study resources into cheating opportunities.

One of the most common culprits is account-based study resources like Quizlet . These are excellent ways to help students study and review key information.

But if you don’t review the settings for who can access the resources, you and your students could inadvertently be helping students cheat!

Your study resources may end up in Google search results, they may be passed between students in different sections of the same class, and more!

That’s why it’s smart to go through any external study tool and review all of the settings available.

Keep an eye out for either privacy settings or accessibility settings to control what students can access and when.

9. Change the Structure of Your Tests

students-cheating-structure

In the era of standardized testing, millions of assessments have adopted the format of multiple choice questions.

Rather than asking these questions that rely on students memorizing information, challenge their critical thinking skills by asking open-ended questions.

Even if a student tries to peek at another person’s answers, it’s unlikely they’ll be able to copy the information down.

If they do, you’ll see two identical answers from students who sit next to each other -- a certain indicator someone was cheating!

10. Create an Atmosphere of Asking Questions

students-cheating-asking-questions

If you have a group of students who struggle to take tests but don’t like to ask for help, this is the strategy for you!

Try changing your teaching style to encourage students to ask questions at any point in time, without being reprimanded for interrupting class.

It’s also a great idea to have them think critically about what you’re discussing and give their own opinions on the topic.

You could even set up a way for students to have better access to remediation when needed.

This strategy helps students feel more comfortable asking for help, improving their own knowledge, and succeeding on tests.

11. Change How You Define Success in Your Classroom

students-cheating-success

For any teacher, it can be easy to keep a mental note of “good” and “bad” students. Good students get good grades and bad students don’t, and everyone knows who is on which list.

But if that’s how you define success, you’re only feeding the problem of cheating to get good grades!

Praising effort and progress over grades can encourage active learning in “bad” students.

By acknowledging the hard work of every student in your class, you’re showing that you care more about their work ethic than the numbers next to their name.

After all, you went into teaching to help students learn -- not to teach to a test!

How Do You Prevent Cheating in Your Classroom?

We’ve shared our top 11 tips for preventing cheating, but there’s a lot of other ideas out there!

Is there anything missing from our list that you found helped in your classroom?

Are you looking for even more ideas?

Join the AES Educator Community to share your thoughts and ask other teachers what they’re doing!

Share Your Anti-Cheating Strategies Now!

3 Methods to Help Prevent Cheating

how to prevent cheating on homework

My students are laser focused: the class’ first exam is approaching and the class review has turned into a series of rapid-fire questions:

“How many questions will there be?”

“Can we use a formula sheet?”

“Is it open notes? Please! Can it be open notes?”

Although most of the questions focus on the logistics and format of the exam, there are a few panicky voices that try to get a sense of what they need to catch up on and study.  And while we as instructors try to prepare our students and hope that they understood our lesson material, there is always the concern for students who will make the decision to cheat rather than to adequately prepare and study for the exam.

So, what can be done to prevent or at least mitigate cheating? Here are a few tips:

Outline Academic Dishonesty Policies & Consequences

  • Discuss cheating early.

Have a clear statement about academic misconduct on your syllabus with concrete repercussions and talk about it in the first week of the course. Be precise with your words. If you are unsure about how to write your policy, ask colleagues or your institution’s student conduct officer for advice. They often have blurbs  prewritten for faculty  to adapt to their courses.

  • Discuss cheating often.

Before each exam, especially the first one of the course, remind students of your expectations. Specifically, mention what aids can or cannot be used during the exam. Explain that you will hold them accountable. Studies suggest that these regular dialogues do prevent some cheating. (Lang, 177-78)

Carefully Organize Your Exam and Classroom – Make Cheating Noticeable.

  • Use multiple versions of an exam/test if possible.

Be mindful as you pass them out so that students near each other receive different versions. Any students with wandering eyes are likely to copy the wrong answer, making evidence easier to collect and verify.

  • Consider using colored paper.

This makes any unauthorized papers on the desk easily recognizable. I use a different color each exam so that students cannot easily sneak in a crib sheet of the right color.

  • If the exam takes place in a lab, use screen monitoring software.

This is a practice I use extensively in my Emporium model College Algebra course (with  Farconics Insight ). I can easily check to make sure no other tabs or windows are open besides the one containing the exam. If your lab doesn’t have such software, consider asking your department chair or technology resources office if it could be purchased. (In addition to helping to monitor students, many programs also allow for screen sharing, polls, and other helpful class resources.)

  • Be mindful of patterns.

Does a student often ask to go to the restroom during class assignments? Do a student’s test scores seem unexpected when compared to previous work and class discussion? Is he/she suddenly in a different seat for the exam day? I’m not saying that restroom breaks and a considerable improvement from one test to another should be counted as indisputable evidence of cheating, but multiple occurrences may be indicative of a pattern worth investigating.

Consider Changes to Your Course Structure and Philosophy

In his book,  Cheating Lessons: Learning from Academic  Dishonesty , James Lang “argue(s) that the responsibility for enforcement of academic honesty should not be the primary responsibility of students.” Instead, “academic dishonesty happens in the courses that we design, that we are teaching and that we have the responsibility for administering. If students are cheating in our classes, we should take primary responsibility for discovering that and responding to it.” (Lang, 170)

Lang’s work, both in his book and his regular articles for  The Chronicle of Higher Education ,  offers practical advice and case studies on course design. I’ll describe some of his suggestions, but I encourage checking out his work.

  • Give students valid reasons to learn the material.

Lang refers to this as “intrinsic motivation,” pointing out that old standbys like “This will be on the test” and “You will need in for the next course” are not particularly effective. The importance of your subject may be apparent to you, but it might not be to students who are experiencing it for possibly the first time. Find a way to connect the subject to the world around them. Give it a purpose. Easier said than done, I know, but the careful reflection on our part can result in more meaningful learning for our students.

  • Place emphasis on mastery of the material, not performance on a given day.

Look for ways for your students to show they understand the lessons besides the cut-and-dried quiz and exam pattern. This may mean more assignments, more flexibility in choosing assignments, or even individualized paths, but giving students more ownership and opportunities to showcase their knowledge may likely increase their learning.

REFERENCES:

Lang, James. (2013). Cheating Lessons: Learning from Academic Dishonesty. Cambridge, Massachusetts: Harvard University Press.

https://www.mga.edu/student-conduct/faculty-resources.php

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8 Ways to Prevent Students From Cheating With AI

Image representing the power of AI.

Academic integrity has been a fundamental aspect of higher education for years, but with the rise of AI tools comes new barriers for instructors to maintain it. The temptation for students to cheat using AI has grown, making it essential for educators to adopt innovative strategies to combat it effectively. In this article, we’ll explore various methods to prevent students from cheating with AI, with help from Cengage online learning platforms such as WebAssign , MindTap , CNOWv2 , OWLv2 and SAM .

Educate students on your school’s definition of cheating

Do your students understand exactly what is considered “cheating”? Rather than assume students fully understand what cheating entails, reinforce your school’s honor code including the acceptable use of AI technology. This can be achieved through your syllabus, workshops, orientation sessions or online modules. By promoting awareness and understanding, your students are more likely to uphold academic integrity.

Tip: If you’re using WebAssign , you can assign the Academic Integrity assignment found in the  Math Success toolkit to help students understand and reflect on the definition of academic integrity.

Remind students of your academic integrity policy with an honor code pledge

Before your exam begins, or within your exam, add a question requiring students to confirm that they will not cheat or commit academic dishonesty throughout the exam. Within this question, you may choose to include examples of cheating—including the use of AI—and reminders of the consequences of committing academic dishonesty. This will serve as a real-time reminder of how serious academic integrity is to your course, and the implications of using outside resources.

Tip: In WebAssign , you can access an Honor Code question template by searching question ID: 4625294 to use as a starting point.

Rethink how you assess learning

One of the key strategies to combat cheating with AI tools is to rethink how you assess student learning. Instead of relying solely on multiple-choice questions and easily searchable answers, consider alternative assessment methods that truly gauge a student’s understanding.

Incorporate questions with visual or interactive elements

Rather than assigning a multiple-choice question, utilize questions that have a visual or interactive component. Incorporating visual elements, such as images, graphs, videos or diagrams, into assessments can deter cheating as students can’t copy these elements into AI tools. These elements require students to analyze, interpret, visualize and sometimes interact with a concept. This is not easily replicable by AI tools. Visual questions also add depth to the assessment process.

Assign projects

In courses like Statistics, Physics and Chemistry, among others, projects can be an excellent assessment tool. These real-world, hands-on assignments require students to apply their knowledge in a practical context, making it harder for AI to provide answers. Encouraging critical thinking and problem-solving skills through projects ensures students truly grasp the concepts.

“I use projects that we complete in steps, so I see their work piece by piece.” – Angela Nino, Dallas College

Leverage open-ended questions

Use a mix of question types, including open-ended, scenario-based, and critical thinking or problem-solving questions. Open-ended questions, in particular, force students to demonstrate their true understanding, as they cannot rely on AI-generated responses.

Assigning tasks that are tailored to each student’s unique experiences, interests, or background can significantly reduce cheating through AI tools. For example, ask them to correlate the concept to an experience in their real life. When assignments are personalized, it becomes challenging for students to find pre-generated content online.

Ask students to upload their work

If your course requires students to complete multiple steps, or think independently to get the answer, this strategy is for you. You can assign file upload questions in MindTap , WebAssign , CNOWv2 and SAM. These questions prompt students to upload pictures or documents containing their work from the exam. You’ll want to inform students that they will be required to submit their work at the end of the exam by mentioning it in class or in the instructions of your assignment.

Tip: If you’re delivering a timed test or LockDown browser for your exam, you should create a follow-up assignment that doesn’t contain these restrictions and ask your students to submit their work there. This will ensure they can upload a file and won’t use up any of their test time.

Consider new ways to deliver assignments to students

In addition to the types of content you provide to students, you should also reconsider how you’re delivering your assignments.

Use timed assignments

Setting reasonable time limits for exams and assignments is an effective way to thwart cheating with AI tools. When students have limited time, it becomes more challenging to rely on AI models for all their answers. Timed assignments encourage them to focus on understanding and applying the material rather than seeking shortcuts.

Tip: All Cengage platforms such as WebAssign, MindTap, CNOWv2, OWLv2 and SAM offer timed tests.

Schedule frequent assessments

Frequent assessments throughout the course can reduce the temptation to cheat with AI tools. By breaking the course into smaller, regular assessments, students are less likely to procrastinate and resort to cheating to cope with the pressure of one big final exam.

The great thing about using Cengage online learning platforms is you don’t have to create all these additional assignments on your own! You can use pre-built assignments or questions to easily create additional assessments for students.

In the age of AI tools, combating cheating in higher education requires creative and proactive strategies. By rethinking assessment methods, emphasizing the honor code pledge and implementing personalized, time-bound and visual assessments, you can reduce the allure of cheating with AI tools. Plus, you can save time in doing so, with the help of Cengage online learning platforms.

Download the Cheating and Academic Dishonesty eBook to learn more about how to stop cheating in your course.

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  • Teaching and Learning with Blackboard

Tips for Preventing Cheating

Although it may be difficult to prevent cheating entirely, faculty can implement steps to reduce its impact in the student learning assessment process for online courses. The following are some practical tips to prevent or reduce cheating for two common learning assessment activities, namely testing and homework assignments.

Tips for Testing

Purposefully select assessment methods.

Use online testing, particularly objective test (i.e., multiple choice, multiple answer, true/false) for lower stakes assessment of student learning. In assessing student mastery of course goals and objectives, objective tests should be only one option considered among a spectrum of methods considered. Each type of assessment method may be designed to measure different indicators of student learning based on course goals and objectives. While an objective test can measure a student’s ability to recall or organize information, other methods can be used to assess higher order/critical thinking skills including understanding, applying, analyzing, evaluating, and creating (Krathwohl, 2001).

Mix Objective and Subjective Questions

While online testing can include objective measures (multiple choice, multiple answer, true/false, fill in the blank, etc.), faculty can also include short answer or essay questions. This type of question is more subjective in nature and may demand a deeper understanding of the subject being tested. While mixing objective and subjective type questions may not discourage or stop sharing of information, it may limit the effect on the student’s final grade (Watson and Sottile, 2010).

Use Question Pools

Rather than using a fixed number of items that remain unchanged for each administration of the test, consider creating a question pool . Questions can be grouped by any number of criteria, including topic, subject matter, question type or difficulty of question. A pool will generate an assessment with randomized questions selected by the faculty member. Pools can be created from new questions or questions in existing tests or pools. Pools are most effective when there are large numbers of questions in one group. For example, one might have a pool of true/false questions, another of multiple choice and a third for fill in the blank. The faculty member could then create an assessment drawing a specific number of questions from each of the question-type pools. Faculty can also add new questions to pools each time the course is taught to expand the variability of questions. Conversely, older questions can be removed. Check the Teaching and Learning with Blackboard Question Pools web page for more details.

Randomize Questions

When creating a test in Blackboard, one test option allows faculty to randomize the selection of test questions as well as the order in which they appear. The result is that students are not likely to get the same questions in the same sequence when taking a test. This strategy can address the issue of students who take a test at the same time in order to share answers. This is also relevant if faculty allow students to repeat the test. Each time this occurs, a test will be made up of questions that are randomly selected and ordered.

Limit Feedback

Limit what types of feedback is displayed to students upon completion of a test. Available test options include test ‘Score’, ‘Submitted Answers’, ‘Correct Answers’, and ‘Feedback’. Providing test scores is important feedback that indicates how well students have performed and should be made available. However, through a process of elimination, students may be able to determine the correct answer for each test question if their submitted answers are identified as incorrect, or if the correct answer is provided. Students could lose the incentive to both prepare for testing or to seek out correct answers by reviewing lecture notes, assigned readings, or through group discussion after completing tests. Thus, faculty might reconsider whether to include ‘Submitted Answers’ as an option to be displayed to students. This is especially relevant if faculty have allowed students to repeat tests. Each time a test was taken, students could attempt a different answer for a test question that was previously graded as incorrect. Correct answers to all test questions could eventually be accumulated and passed on to other students, or to students of future classes.

Recognizing the fact that students taking an exam that is not proctored are free to use open book/notes, faculty may decide to use the ‘Set Timer’ feature in Blackboard. Students who adequately prepared for a test may be less likely to rely on open book/notes compared with students unprepared for testing. By setting a test with an expected completion time, unprepared students could have the most to lose as they spend time going over material, and risk not having sufficient time to respond to all the test questions.

Display Questions One-at-a-time

If a test has more than 5 questions, do not choose the ‘All at Once’ option for displaying all the questions on the same screen. It is quite easy for students to take a screen capture of the displayed questions and share them with other students. While students can still screen capture pages with single questions, or even type them into a document, it is more time consuming and unwieldy.

Tips for Homework Assignments

Create application assignments.

Create assignments that require students to apply essential course concepts to a relevant problem. This may force students to seek relevant information beyond the assigned readings and lectures, and conduct independent research by identifying credible sources to support the development of their assignments. Students can be required to report their progress on a regular basis through email, or through the Journal feature in Blackboard. This documentation makes it easier for faculty to see the development of a student’s work from inception to completion, and possibly identify unexplained gaps that could occur if students used the work of others and claimed it as their own. Faculty can add input at any point in this process to provide guidance, and perhaps suggest new directions for students. Both documentation of progress through regular status reporting and occasional faculty input can add a greater level of scrutiny to students, making it more difficult to pass off the work of others as their own.

Create Group Assignments

Create group assignments that require students to interact with group members regularly. Groups can be made responsible for determining the functional roles for each member, establishing a mechanism for accountability (i.e., submitting weekly progress reports), and sharing drafts of individual progress on a group project. For a project to be truly collaborative, each group member should be familiar with everyone else’s work, and be able to describe how every group members’ contribution supports the whole group assignment. Students who are using the work of others may not be able to adequately describe the significance of their ‘own’ work, or how it integrates with the group’s overall project.

Create Assignments that Require Presentations

Faculty with a Blackboard course can use the web conferencing tool, Blackboard Collaborate , to conduct a synchronous online session for class presentations. Students may be asked to submit a progress report or use a Journal to reflect on what they have learned in the past week that supports work toward the presentation. To further scrutinize work on the presentation, students may be asked to include time for questions and answers. Students who have developed the presentation should be comfortable answering a range of topic-related questions. CITL offers workshops and one-on-one consultations on the use Blackboard Collaborate .

Check for Plagiarism using SafeAssign

SafeAssign is a plagiarism prevention tool that detects matches between students’ submitted assignments and existing works by others. These works are found on a number of databases including ProQuest ABI/Inform, Institutional document archives, the Global Reference Database, as well as a comprehensive index of documents available for public access on the internet. SafeAssign can also be used to help students identify how to attribute sources properly rather than paraphrase without citing the original source. Thus, the SafeAssign feature is effective as both a deterrent and an educational tool. 

Use Discussion Assignments

Create a Discussion Board assignment that requires students to demonstrate critical thinking skills by responding to a relevant forum topic. Faculty may also design a rubric that is specific to the Discussion Board assignments, and develop questions that require students to respond to every rubric category. Having assignments that are very specific makes it more difficult for students to use portions of a previous term paper or other sources that may only indirectly touch on the Discussion Board topic.

Include Academic Integrity Policy Statement in the Course Syllabus

Faculty should consider including a policy statement regarding academic integrity in their course syllabus. In addition, faculty may want to reiterate academic policies to students taking an online course and clarifying guidelines for completing test and assignments so that students are not confused about what they can and cannot do. While this, in and of itself, may not be sufficient to change behavior, its acknowledged presence in the syllabus recognizes a commitment to honesty in the academic arena and establishes the clear expectation that academic integrity is an important principle to live by. Faculty may also choose to mention this policy using the ‘Announcements’ feature in Blackboard, or while conducting a live web conference session.

Preserving academic integrity is an ongoing challenge for traditional face-to-face, blended, and entirely online courses. While a number of expensive technology solutions, such as retinal eye scanners and live video monitoring are being developed to prevent cheating in online courses, the practical suggestions offered above can prevent or reduce the impact of cheating on assessing student performance in online courses. For more information on this topic, readers are invited to view the archived online workshop, Tips for Assessing Student Learning Using Blackboard .

In addition, the Center for Innovative Teaching and Learning  offers many Blackboard workshops , including those that touch on assessment. 

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Teaching Tips

Strategies to prevent cheating when using tech in the classroom.

  • The Albert Team
  • Last Updated On: March 1, 2022

Strategies to Prevent Cheating When Using Tech in The Classroom

Setting up systems to prevent cheating is one of those things that is really important to do but not something you really learn in your education master’s program. Whether your students are taking an in-class assessment, working on their homework, or using a tech product like Albert to study for an exam, cheating is a reality that every teacher has to deal with. We’ve compiled a list of strategies to help teachers prevent cheating and help students understand how cheating is detrimental to the learning process.

Understand the root of cheating.

According to research done at the Harvard Graduate School of Education, there are a few reasons why students cheat.

1. Pressure to Achieve

  • This one is obvious but sometimes it’s hard to remember how much pressure teenagers really feel to do well.

2. Unethical/ Misunderstood Collaboration

  • Students say they’re “helping each other,” but really, they’re cheating.

3. Abuse of Digital Tools

  • With digital tools, many students don’t think cheating is really “cheating.”
  • According to research done at Johns Hopkins , 40% of college students considered “digital plagiarism” as either “not cheating or just trivial cheating.”
  • This makes it even more important that we teach students to be responsible with tech tools at the high school level.

So, what can you do about it?

1. celebrate student “failure” and growth.

  • Listing off the highest scores after every quiz inadvertently creates a space where only high achievement is celebrated.
Celebrating these successes will take pressure off students to do things perfectly the first time, which can eliminate the desire to cheat.

2. Be transparent about why you use tech tools

  • Edtech products serve as a resource. They help reinforce information taught in class, can increase confidence, and give teachers insight into what they need to teach, reteach, or deprioritize.
  • Explain how cheating defeats the purpose of all of this!

3. Grade for completion first

  • Let students get familiar with a platform before grading for accuracy.
  • Transition to higher stakes as students know what is expected in terms of performance.

4. Utilize time limits

  • If the edtech product enables time limits, use them every so often.
  • Under a time constraint, it’s more difficult for students to look up/ share answers.

5. Switch up how you use edtech

  • Use it for group work, assignments, quizzes, and homework so students feel really comfortable with the product and less pressure to “perform well” 100% of the time.
  • Give a quiz on paper based on an online assignment. If a students bombs it and scored 100% on the assignment, you’ll know something is up.

6. Offer multiple ways to earn credit

Don’t be afraid to give different students different ways to earn their grade depending on their skill level.
  • Maybe your highest performers need to earn at least an 80% for credit but struggling students can earn credit for attempting an assignment and completing test corrections.

7. Create 2-3 versions of assignments at random times

  • This eliminates the need to create multiple versions of assignments all of the time (which is a lot of work).
  • But it’s enough to prevent students from cheating once they figure out your tactic.

8. Set expectations around tech use with your students

  • Ask students to help you craft a set of “tech use” rules to abide by.
  • Students will be more bought into the rules if they help create them.
  • Clearly define what cheating looks like and create consequences for cheating.

9. Keep parents in the loop

If a student is caught cheating, you want the parent to be supportive of the consequences.

10. Give feedback to the tech company if you have an idea on how to improve the product

  • Here at Albert, we’ve gotten feedback from teachers about creating randomized question order or a more robust assessment tool.
  • Hearing from you helps us figure out how to prioritize these kinds of features.

Remember that building a culture of honesty, accountability, and student ownership comes first. Create a safe space where students feel supported if they fail, and you will deal less with cheating in the first place!

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how to prevent cheating on homework

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Cheat Codes: Students Search For Shortcuts as Virtual Schooling Expands

An eighth grader looks up answers on a cell phone while he is taking an online quiz at home. The pandemic has forced many Oklahoma school districts to shift to part-time or full-time online learning this year.

An eighth grader looks up answers on a cell phone while he is taking an online quiz at home. The pandemic has forced many Oklahoma school districts to shift to part-time or full-time online learning this year. (Whitney Bryen/Oklahoma Watch)

how to prevent cheating on homework

Computer programmer Gradyn Wursten still updates a project he created to hack his high school homework.

As a sophomore, he used an old MacBook with a cracked screen and bulging battery to write the code that adds shortcuts to Edgenuity — an online education platform used by more than   3 million students .

Once installed, his program can skip videos and automatically fill practice questions with answers — progressing straight to quizzes and tests.

Instead of watching a 30-minute history lesson on the Iroquois, students can cut right to the quiz. And those answers are often easily found on the web.

The hacks make it possible to complete a course much faster, students say.

Wursten is more computer savvy than most, but his quest for shortcuts is typical. His program, developed from his home in Heber City, Utah, has been downloaded 40,000 times by students across the country. In the past month, he gained 2,000 new users, including more than 100 in Oklahoma.

And his tool is just one of many available to savvy students.

Entire test keys and quiz answers are posted to homework help websites. Smartphone apps take a photo of a question and produce the answer. Students connect on social media or text groups to share answers. There are even tricks to fake attendance in a Zoom class — demonstrated by a teen’s viral Tik Tok video.

Schools’ large-scale shift to virtual education amid COVID-19 is challenging the system of determining what students actually know and limiting educators’ ability to ensure academic integrity.

Cheating has always been an issue in schools, but there is little getting in the way for students today. Shared answers have become even more accessible as districts have adopted or expanded their use of popular online learning programs like Edgenuity, which delivers the same content to students across the country.

Many schools adopted such virtual programs in a matter of months to adapt to the ongoing public health crisis. Seventy percent of Oklahoma districts had a virtual option at the start of this school year, and 7.5% were exclusively online, according to a state Department of Education   survey .

But when students are not inside classrooms, it becomes more difficult to ensure they are actually learning, teachers say.

“Everything my kids are doing at home is a cheatable assignment, which makes that in-class time so incredibly valuable,” said Elanna Dobbs, who teaches English at Edmond Memorial High School.

Edmond is using a blended schedule, where students attend class some days and are virtual from home the rest of the week.

Dobbs, who has been teaching 19 years, said on virtual days, she relies on class discussions or assignments that task students with providing individual thoughts on what they’ve learned. In other words, the type of assignments they can’t just Google.

Many students aren’t getting any in-person class time, though.

Virtual charter schools are experiencing a surge of enrollment, a trend underway before the pandemic. These schools don’t have classrooms and the students learn mostly from home. Epic Charter Schools says it has 61,000 students enrolled — representing about 1 in 10 Oklahoma students. Other statewide virtual charter schools are experiencing increases.

In virtual charter schools, teachers provide less direct instruction than in a traditional school, with the curriculum program delivering most of the lessons. Parents are expected to fill in the gaps and oversee the learning process.

Research shows it doesn’t work very well. Students enrolled full-time in virtual charter schools learned an equivalent of 72 days fewer in reading and 180 days fewer in math than students in brick-and-mortar schools over one academic year, according to a   2015 study   by the Center for Research on Education Outcomes, a non-partisan research center at Stanford University.

Now, those same methods are being adopted by traditional school districts with the tens of thousands of Oklahoma students attending school from home.

And yet, critics — from parents to the president — have deemed online education inadequate. “Now that we have witnessed it on a large scale basis, and firsthand, Virtual Learning has proven to be TERRIBLE compared to In School, or On Campus, Learning,” President Donald Trump   tweeted July 10.

That month, in Norman, parents railed against a plan to use Edgenuity teachers for all students enrolling in the district’s virtual program. They spoke out at board meetings, and wrote a   letter to the district,   calling it “troubling” that Edgenuity was their only virtual option within the district.

“Our children deserve to have personal interactions with local teachers and classmates as part of their virtual school experience during this pandemic,” they wrote. They urged the district to, among other requests, provide an option for students to learn from Norman teachers, not from “an out-of-state, for-profit venture.”

The district relented and quickly developed an in-house virtual program, in addition to offering Edgenuity.

Relying on Teachers to Spot Discrepancies from Afar

Technology provides some cheating protections. Edgenuity features a locking browser, which restricts students from opening other tabs and programs while the learning platform is open. Epic and Oklahoma Virtual Charter Academy say their teachers can require exams to be proctored, where the student is monitored remotely through a webcam.

Watch videos related to this reporting on Oklahoma Watch’s website.

Students can bypass these protections. Often, it’s no more difficult than pulling up answers on a smartphone. A   2018 study by Pew Research Center   found 95% of teens have a smartphone, or at least access to one. Even kindergarten students know how to ask a smart speaker their homework questions.

Yet the companies providing the lessons say it’s up to users to provide the accountability and prevent cheating.

“Edgenuity trusts the integrity of teachers, administrations, and even students themselves, to ensure that students learn and succeed fairly,” wrote Deborah Rayow, Edgenuity’s Vice President of Instructional Design & Learning Science, in response to Oklahoma Watch’s questions.

Edgenuity, an Arizona-based online curriculum company, is being used by at least some virtual students in Norman, Union, Stillwater and other school districts.

Another program, Exact Path, is being used in more than 400 Oklahoma districts. The state Education Department used CARES Act funds to enter into a $2.6 million contract with parent company, Edmentum, to offer   Exact Path free to districts . Exact Path is an online learning tool that can be used for assessment and instruction in kindergarten through 12th grade.

Districts are, in some cases, using Exact Path even when school is in-person, to make it easier to pivot to distance learning because of an outbreak or need to quarantine.

Edmentum says because Exact Path adapts to individual students, it is difficult to use online social networks to find answers. And the company works with popular homework help sites like Quizlet and Brainly to “ensure our content is not posted on their sites,” a spokesperson said.

Exact Path also alerts teachers to unusual behavior — such as answering too quickly.

LIke Edgenuity, Edmentum emphasizes teachers’ responsibility to prevent cheating.

One of the most effective things teachers can do to prevent cheating is to design their own online curriculum, or at least supplement the platform’s assignments with their own, said Derald Glover, assistant executive director of the Oklahoma Association of School Administrators.

The bare minimum schools should be doing this year is placing a student on a virtual school platform and letting them go, he said.  Additional safeguards teachers can add are class discussions via Zoom, or having students submit videos of themselves explaining their answers.

Glover said he’s encouraging educators to treat online tools as a digital textbook, and design virtual courses themselves.

But that takes time.

“We think it’s going to take most of this year to realistically build really rich teacher-developed (virtual) courses,” Glover said.

At-Home Learning Assumes Parents Can Supervise

Parents are showing little patience to wait. The fervor over inadequate education at home is growing, and the lack of teacher interaction is one of the main reasons.

Norman schools bent to parental pressure and transitioned to in-person school in late September, despite no change in the Cleveland County’s color-coded coronavirus risk designation.

A group of Stillwater parents filed a lawsuit against the district to force a return to classrooms. The district of 6,300 students uses Edgenuity for students who chose full-time virtual learning.

Parent Nicole Wisel wishes her children’s school district, Cimarron Public Schools, would return to paper, pencils and textbooks instead of using Edgenuity.

“We hate it,” said Wisel, who has children in seventh, eighth and 11th grades. “Our teachers are being paid to be proctors, and that’s it. They don’t even know what these kids are doing.”

The prerecorded video lessons are too long, she says, and one of her children, who is autistic, says the instructors in the videos are “creepy.”

Chuck Anglin, Cimarron Public Schools’ superintendent, said he likes to use Edgenuity to offer extra classes in a normal year. Choosing it for virtual learning this year was making “the best of a bad situation,” he said.

He agrees that when kids are learning from home, the onus to prevent cheating is mostly on parents.

“We are not programmed for distance learning,” said Anglin, whose school district is located 12 miles west of Enid. “We are programmed to have the kids there, where we can see their faces, we can read their eyes, we can tell if they are still engaged. We can see if they’re looking around to see if anybody’s watching while they’ve got their phone in their lap.”

Researchers at the National Education Policy Center, a research center at the University of Colorado Boulder, found that relying on a computer program to teach and assess is one of the most detrimental aspects of online education.

The researchers found these programs actually impede and marginalize the teacher’s role. “Teachers may be unable to see how their students earned the designation of mastery of a goal because in some applications, the software, not the teacher, determines questions asked and the grades assigned,” they wrote in a   2019 report .

They also found that students would just look up answers on their computers — in a separate browser or on a smartphone — while taking assessments. The students quickly realize a computer is easy to trick compared to a human teacher.

This is at the heart of the cheating issue. Are students spending school days engaged in live lessons with a local teacher who is crafting curriculum to meet their needs? Or are they watching videos that explain content and clicking through multiple choice questions?

Katie Harris teaches senior English at Oklahoma Virtual Charter Academy, a statewide virtual school run by the national company K12, Inc. In her first year, students turned in a lot of plagiarized essays, she said. Now, she knows she has to rewrite her lessons, assignments, quizzes and tests every year.

“I say, ‘look, if I Google this exact writing prompt, I can find whole essays online. Don’t do that,’” she said.

K12 schools use their own virtual curriculum, not Edgenuity or Exact Path. A plagiarism detection service, Turnitin, automatically scans students’ work.

At Epic Charter Schools, the state’s largest virtual school, teachers can be responsible for students in all grades and subjects — and outside what they are certified to teach. Families can choose from more than a dozen learning platforms (Edgenuity and Exact Path among them), making it particularly difficult to supplement or build their own course.

To prevent cheating, Epic teachers proctor students’ benchmarking tests — in person, if possible, or via video conference, said Shelly Hickman, a spokeswoman for Epic. Teachers also can investigate if there are major discrepancies in a student’s scores on daily work compared to the proctored exams.

But Epic teachers are only   required to meet   with students face-to-face once every three weeks. Some teachers will meet more frequently, depending on the families’ needs.

Online Classes Create a ‘Psychological Distance’

Psychologists who study human behavior have found that most people will cheat — not a lot, but a little. Researcher Dan Ariely calls this the   “fudge factor.” 

Ariely, a professor at Duke University and author of the book   “The Honest Truth About Dishonesty,”   explains how and why cheating in online courses is easier than in a physical classroom.

“Gone are the quaint days of minutely lettered cheat sheets, formulas written on the underside of baseball cap bills, sweat-smeared key words on students’ palms. Now it’s just a student sitting alone at home, looking up answers online and simply filling them in,” he wrote in   this article   eight years ago, when virtual schools were still fairly new to Oklahoma.

He says the physical distance provided by online classes — distance from the teacher, the students, and the school building — creates a psychological distance that “allows people to further relax their moral standards.”

It’s also true that cheating exists on a continuum. Wursten, for instance, drew the line at automating quiz and test answers — the graded content.

Wursten, who graduated in 2019 and is now certified to work in IT, still adds features to his program — called Edgentweaks — as a “fun side project,” and because he wants to help other students avoid the drudgery he once faced.

Meanwhile, Edgenuity has patched his hacks in a virtual game of cat and mouse.

“I’ve found ways that I could automatically get the correct answers for things like tests and quizzes, but I did not actually write a tweak for it because I consider that cheating,” Wursten said. “I don’t intend to actually make a cheat tool.”

Even apps and websites created to assist students on their virtual learning path have been co-opted into cheat tools.

Brainly has a smartphone app that lets students scan homework or test questions, and answers pop up immediately. On Quizlet, another homework help website, entire test keys are posted and shared among students. Even pre-written essays are easily found, students say. Photomath, another app, produces not only the answer to a math problem, but all the steps needed for students to show their work.

Brainly and Quizlet have policies against cheating. But that’s unlikely to deter students, whether they are enrolled in a virtual school or are attending class face-to-face.

Mackenzie Snovel, who graduated from Owasso last year, said she found 90% of the answers for her senior English and history classes online — and even used Brainly to complete her final exam.

She said she didn’t see an issue with looking up answers because “they were classes I needed to graduate and none of that information I will need in my career.”

Technology is No Substitute

With students and teachers separated by distance, some of the academic integrity responsibility falls to the IT department.

They block websites known to be used for cheating. They may facilitate online exam proctoring, where students are monitored while taking a test through their webcam.

At Union Public Schools near Tulsa, the district has implemented several of these security measures but only on school-owned devices. Most students can easily access another device, though.

While Union is using Edgenuity for all middle and high school students who chose virtual this year, teachers will be adding in extra assignments to supplement the online tool, said Gart Morris, the district’s executive director of instructional technology.

“The curriculum in Edgenuity is limited,” he said. “Our own teachers are beefing up the curriculum to meet our standards.”

The district has about 2,700 middle and high school students who chose virtual learning this year. He believes the best tool to combat cheating is cementing the student to teacher relationships.

“It’s always a challenge to get one step ahead. There’s thousands of them and there’s not thousands of us,” Morris said. “You can look at technology in a way to try to prevent cheating but nothing works as well as a good solid relationship between students and an adult.”

Oklahoma Watch reporter Whitney Bryen contributed to this report.

This story is part of a collaboration with  Oklahoma Watch  through FRONTLINE’s Local Journalism Initiative, which is funded by the John S. and James L. Knight Foundation and the Corporation for Public Broadcasting.

Jennifer Palmer , Oklahoma Watch

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RETHINK Math Teacher

How to Stop Students from Using the PhotoMath App

January 20, 2021 rethinkmathteacher.com Differentiation , Math Teaching Resources , Teaching Resources 0

how to prevent cheating on homework

Math teachers are getting more and more frustrated with PhotoMath and other apps that literally do the students’ homework for them.

Just download the app, point your phone’s camera at the picture of the problem in your math textbook, worksheet, or even your handwritten copy of the problem, and viola! Not only will it instantly show you the solution, but it will even show you the step by step work, so you can show that too!

Cheating has never been easier!

Obviously, we all know that cheating is bad. Students will not learn the concept because they’re cheating, and then they will fail the test! They will also struggle with math as it gets progressively more difficult, since they haven’t learned the prerequisite skills needed to do the work – since they were always just pointing their phone camera.

I host the greatest Facebook Group for math teachers and this question comes up repeatedly: How do we create PhotoMath App proof questions so that students can’t cheat on their homework.

There are always a multitude of answers. Suggestions include

  • Use emoji’s instead of variables
  • Write the problems as words instead of numbers
  • Use “i” as the variable
  • Use symbols for variables (I’m noticing a theme)
  • Use dark backgrounds that you put the problems over
  • Show the steps and ask students which step was an error
  • Use FlipGrid and watch them work it live
  • Have students model one of the homework questions in class
  • Short answers instead of solutions

While all of these ideas might work, for now, I promise you that another app (or an upgrade of this one) is coming that will side step all of these attempts. Or, students can just rewrite the problem from the words, or change the emoji’s to letters, and then the app will work just fine.

We will not be able to defeat the rise of technology and the endless opportunities to cheat that come with it.

Here are two solutions I would like to recommend.

Solution 1: ditch that homework.

The first solution is from Alice Keeler and Matt Miller, authors of “ Ditch that Homework .”

how to prevent cheating on homework

For a plethora of reasons that they dive into in their book, they recommend no longer assigning homework to your students. One of the reasons that they present is that homework promotes cheating. And the PhotoMath App is a perfect illustration of just that.

Instead, maximize your time in class, and have your students do their independent work in class, with you there to help them, provide feedback, and make sure no one is using their cell phone!

Method 2: Remediation through Learning Stations

The second solution can be found in Chris Skierski’s book, Reach Them All . Which outlines an instructional delivery method to differentiate your instruction through Skills Based Learning Stations .

In this methodology, Chris assesses his students to see what skill they need to work on. Each student is put into an independently running learning station to develop that skill.

After three days of instruction and practice, students are given a quiz to see if they have mastered the concept they’re working on. If they have, they are promoted to the next skill. If not, they are remediated and remain working on that skill.

By keeping the student on the skill until they master it, cheating is discouraged, because if the student cheats on the independent work, they will not master the quiz (since they bypassed the learning phase).

Immediate Feedback

In the above methedology, Skierski also provides his students with answer sheets or solutions that show the work to EVERY problem that the students work on within the station.

Through this, he further discourages cheating, because the answers are provided. “No need to cheat, no need to use the PhotoMath app, I’ve already given you the answers! I just want you to check them AFTER you do the work, not before. And if you make a mistake, catch it, and fix it, so you learn from it.”

In John Hattie’s book, Visible Learning for Teachers , we learn that the most valuable tool a teacher can use is immediate feedback . This allows students to learn from their mistakes, or gain confidence as they do the work correctly.

how to prevent cheating on homework

Stop Fighting a Losing Battle

Yes, cheating is bad. And students should not do it (nor should adults).

But it’s just too easy these days. So stop fighting a battle you cannot win. Instead, start utilizing some more highly effective teaching strategies.

Hattie’s book also shows us that homework has very little effect on students’ comprehension. So listen to the experts. Instead, focus on immediate feedback, and enough practice repetitions to help your students get it.

Learn More about Learning Stations

To learn more about how Chris differentiates his instruction to reach all of his students, you can read his book, Reach Them All . He also has an online, video-based course that will walk you through the process of creating your own stations to reach your students while providing them with immediate feedback and as much practice repetitions as they need.

You can get the first unit of this online course entirely free by clicking here .

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IMAGES

  1. 6 Ways to Prevent Cheating on Homework

    how to prevent cheating on homework

  2. Why Students Cheat on Homework and How to Prevent It

    how to prevent cheating on homework

  3. 6 Ways to Prevent Cheating on Homework

    how to prevent cheating on homework

  4. Stop Students From Cheating on Homework With These Easy Ideas

    how to prevent cheating on homework

  5. 6 Ways to Prevent Cheating on Homework

    how to prevent cheating on homework

  6. 8 Ways to Prevent Cheating in the Classroom

    how to prevent cheating on homework

COMMENTS

  1. Why Students Cheat on Homework and How to Prevent It

    So. What is a teacher to do? We need to be able to assess students. Why do students cheat on homework, and how can we address it? Like most new teachers, I learned the hard way over the course of many years of teaching that it is possible to reduce cheating on homework, if not completely prevent it.

  2. Stop Students From Cheating on Homework With These Easy Ideas

    Step 1: Check the quality of your assignments. First of all, it's worth taking a close look at the kind of homework you assign. If you do a lot of worksheets, you might find those work better for in-class activities. Instead, try focusing homework on in-depth writing assignments and individual written responses.

  3. 3 Ways to Prevent Students from Cheating

    Method 1 Preventing Cheating on Tests Download Article 1 Don't allow access to test materials. It is important to keep test materials secure before a test. This includes making sure that all copies and the original are accounted for after copying.

  4. The Real Roots of Student Cheating

    Although students often regard some forms of cheating, such as doing homework together when they are expected to do it alone, as trivial, the studies find that young people view cheating in...

  5. How to Avoid Cheating

    Identify your alternatives to cheating, such as asking your professor for an extension or even accepting a disappointing grade. If you find yourself in a predicament and are thinking about cheating, pause before you act. Remember that cheating is unethical and you have alternatives. Tell your professor your situation.

  6. Achieve Homework Anti-Cheating Tips

    Tips to Prevent Cheating on Homework in Achieve becky_anderson Macmillan Employee 1 0 3,206 04-23-2021 09:00 AM How do you keep students from cheating on homework? This is an age old question that isn't tied to using online homework. Back in the day, students would pay other people to do their pencil and paper homework.

  7. How Teens Use Technology to Cheat in School

    Copying and Pasting Social Media When you were in school, teens who were cheating were likely looking at a neighbor's paper or copying a friend's homework. The most high-tech attempts to cheat may have involved a student who wrote the answers to a test on the cover of their notebook.

  8. 8 Ways to Reduce Student Cheating in High School

    1. Change your language: Sometimes, unintentionally, our language and behavior reinforce an emphasis on correct answers and grades. During instruction, try to use more open-ended questions that begin with "Why" or "How." Emphasize process instead of final, definitive answers.

  9. Why Students Cheat—and What to Do About It

    But students also rationalize cheating on assignments they see as having value. High-achieving students who feel pressured to attain perfection (and Ivy League acceptances) may turn to cheating as a way to find an edge on the competition or to keep a single bad test score from sabotaging months of hard work. At Stuyvesant, for example, students ...

  10. Combating Academic Dishonesty, Part 1

    The Aims of This Series. Academic dishonesty - a term that encompasses a wide range of behaviors, from unauthorized collaboration and falsifying bibliographies to cheating on exams and buying pre-written essays - is a serious problem for higher education. Left unchecked, academic dishonesty can damage the culture of integrity that colleges ...

  11. How to Avoid Online Cheating & Encourage Learning Instead

    How to Avoid Online Cheating & Encourage Learning Instead Students tempted to find easy answers while distance learning By Sherry Posnick-Goodwin Joline Martinez suspected many of her students were cheating after her school closed last spring and she transitioned to distance learning.

  12. Why Do Students Cheat?

    Posted July 19, 2016 By Zachary Goldman In March, Usable Knowledge published an article on ethical collaboration, which explored researchers' ideas about how to develop classrooms and schools where collaboration is nurtured but cheating is avoided.

  13. 17 Tips to Help You Stop Students from Cheating

    One way to reduce cheating is to create an environment that does not condone it. Teachers should make it clear that cheating is unacceptable and will not be tolerated. They should also enforce disciplinary actions for students who cheat, such as failing the assignment or receiving a lower grade.

  14. 11 Ways to Prevent Cheating in Schools

    1. Talk About Honesty & Integrity Discussing honesty and integrity is a great starting point for any teacher who has concerns about cheating in the classroom. Even though your students may have already learned these concepts, it's a good idea to discuss them in relation to your class specifically.

  15. 3 Methods to Help Prevent Cheating

    Discuss cheating often. Before each exam, especially the first one of the course, remind students of your expectations. Specifically, mention what aids can or cannot be used during the exam. Explain that you will hold them accountable. Studies suggest that these regular dialogues do prevent some cheating. (Lang, 177-78)

  16. 8 Ways to Prevent Students From Cheating With AI

    One of the key strategies to combat cheating with AI tools is to rethink how you assess student learning. Instead of relying solely on multiple-choice questions and easily searchable answers, consider alternative assessment methods that truly gauge a student's understanding. Incorporate questions with visual or interactive elements

  17. Tips for Preventing Cheating

    The following are some practical tips to prevent or reduce cheating for two common learning assessment activities, namely testing and homework assignments. Tips for Testing Purposefully Select Assessment Methods

  18. PDF Teaching for Integrity: Steps to Prevent Cheating in Your Classroom

    Communicate and Care One of the most important things you can do to reduce cheating in your classroom is to communicate to students that you are aware that academic dishonesty is a problem and that you take the issue seriously. Practical steps to communicate your concern include:

  19. Advice on How to Prevent Academic Dishonesty

    Homework assignments Since collected homework can never be fully screened for copying, it may be more effective to put greater effort into preventing cheating on in-class exams and quizzes which can be closely monitored or in final projects, and instead de-emphasize the role of graded homework in determining course grades.

  20. Combatting Cheating

    In my experience, the best way to deter cheating is to keep the homework low-stakes. That is, I make homework worth only a small percentage of the course grade, and I keep the grading policy relatively lenient (i.e., low attempt penalty and high number of attempts). That way students are less incentivized to cheat on homework, and those who do ...

  21. How to Prevent Cheating When Using Technology in Your Classroom

    Teaching Tips Strategies to Prevent Cheating When Using Tech in The Classroom The Albert Team Last Updated On: March 1, 2022 Setting up systems to prevent cheating is one of those things that is really important to do but not something you really learn in your education master's program.

  22. Cheat Codes: Students Search For Shortcuts as Virtual Schooling ...

    October 23, 2020 by Jennifer Palmer Computer programmer Gradyn Wursten still updates a project he created to hack his high school homework. As a sophomore, he used an old MacBook with a cracked...

  23. How to Stop Students from Using the PhotoMath App

    Solution 1: Ditch that Homework. The first solution is from Alice Keeler and Matt Miller, authors of " Ditch that Homework .". For a plethora of reasons that they dive into in their book, they recommend no longer assigning homework to your students. One of the reasons that they present is that homework promotes cheating.