Paraphrasing or Summarizing

"In short, adoption is a ubiquitous social institution in American society, creating invisible relationships with biological and adoptive kin that touch far more people

than we imagine.”

Which one is the best paraphrase of this sentence?

• In America, more people are adopted than was originally thought.

• Adoption touches a surprising number of people throughout American society.

• Because adoptees are “invisible,” their circumstances are hard to imagine.

• Relationships between biological and adoptive kin have international scope.

Original Source:

“The amount of time females allocated to maintenance behaviors, including self-preening, preening nestlings, allopreening, and maintaining their nest, decreased by 30% in response to hikers.”

Student's Entry:

The presence of hikers reduced female owls’ preening, of themselves, their young and their mates, and nest maintenance behaviors by over 25% (Swarthout & Steidl 2003).

• This is an example of plagiarism.

• This is not an example of plagiarism.

Original Source:

“The amount of time females allocated to maintenance behaviors, including self-preening, preening nestlings, allopreening, and maintaining their nest, decreased by 30% in response to hikers.”

Student's Entry:

The amount of time female owls dedicated to maintaining their nest, self-preening, allopreening and preening nestlings decreased 30% in response to hikers (Swarthout & Steidl 2003).

• Yes, this is an example of plagiarism.

• No, this is not an example of plagiarism.

Original Source:

In fact, between 1980 and 2000 the U.S. government has devoted some $19 billion in tax breaks alone to the ethanol from-corn effort, according to the U.S. Government Accountability Office, and ethanol subsidies per liter of the biofuel have often been larger than the total cost of a liter of gas the biofuel replaced. A significant portion of the profits made by agribusiness giants like Poet or Archer Daniels Midland—which, along with oil company Valero, are responsible for the bulk of ethanol produced in the U.S.—can be attributed to this government largesse with taxpayer dollars.

Text in student’s paper:

The federal government has spent billions of dollars in subsidies to corn-ethanol, of which a substantial portion has profited a handful of agribusiness companies (Biello 2011).

Reference (APA style):

Biello D. (2011, July 28). Intoxicated on independence: is domestically produced ethanol worth the cost? Scientific American. Retrieved from

http://www.scientificamerican.com/article.cfm?id=ethanol-domestic-fuel-supply-or-environmental-boondoggle.

• Correct Phrase or Summary

• This is an example of plagiarism

Original source:

NASQAN is a network of 39 stations located along the main stems and on the major tributaries of four large rivers. The locations for these stations were generally selected where large differences in mass flux were expected or where inputs and outputs of major reservoirs could be measured.

Text in student’s paper:

The National Stream Quality Accounting Network consists of a network of 39 stations along the main stems and on the major tributaries of four large rivers. The locations were generally selected where large differences in mass flux were expected or where inputs and outputs of major reservoirs could be measured (Hooper et al. 2001).

Reference:

Hooper, R.P., Aulenbach, B.T., & Kelly, V.J. (2001). The National Stream Quality Accounting Network: a flux-based approach to monitoring the water quality of large rivers. Hydrological Processes, 15(7).. Retrieved from http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/.

• This is a correct paraphrase or summary.

• This is an example of plagiarism.

“Third, in a nation that sanctifies blood kinship, adoptive families and adoptees are stigmatized because of their lack of biological relationship.”

Which one is the best paraphrase of the sentence?

• Nations that sanctify blood relationships are often stigmatized.

• Adoptive families and adoptees are treated like criminals in nations that over-value blood relationships.

• Where blood kinship is excessively valued, adoption is considered inferior.

• In some nations, adoptees do not have the same legal relationship to their adoptive parents as blood kin have to their birth parents.

Original Text: The MESSENGER spacecraft will first perform two flyby missions, in which it will gather data on the planet Mercury. In these flybys, MESSENGER will measure Mercury's atmosphere, magnetic pull, and surface composition.
Paraphrase the text above, making sure to identify all the writer's main points. Don't forget to look up any unfamiliar words.

• MESSENGER is scheduled to travel past Mercury to get information about the planet. The spacecraft's trips will give us data about Mercury's surface, atmosphere, and gravity.
• The MESSENGER spacecraft will first perform two flyby missions, in which it will measure Mercury's atmosphere, magnetic pull, and surface composition.
• Past missions to Mercury haven't been successful because of the heat. MESSENGER is designed to orbit close to the sun.
• MESSENGER will provide useful information about Mercury during its flyby missions.