5 Ways to Avoid Plagiarism

Paraphrase

Rewrite or restate the author's ideas using your own words.

Our country was founded 87 years ago on the concept of equality for all men (Lincoln).

Summarize

Write a shortened version of the author's work that includes the main ideas.

Our country was founded on the concept of equality for all men, and we are at war for that cause. We have come here thinking we will bless the site of a great battle, but our heroic soldiers have already done so with the ultimate sacrifice. To honor those who have died here, we must hold fast to our goal of preserving for the world a people’s government. (Lincoln)

Use Direct Quotation

Write the exact words of an author using quotation marks and parenthetical citation.

"Four score and seven years ago our fathers brought forth, upon this continent, a new nation, conceived in liberty..." (Lincoln).

Use in-text Citation

The first word of the works cited & a page number, if available, written in ( ) parentheses following someone else's idea.

Our country was founded 87 years ago on the concept of equality for all men (Lincoln).

Include a Works Cited Page

List all the sources you used to write your paper and follow a standard format. (MLA, APA, etc

Example

Works Cited

Lincoln, Abraham. "Transcript of Gettysburg Address 1863." Our Documents. National Archives and Records Administration, n.d.Web. 14 Aug. 2013. <http://www.ourdocuments.gov/doc.php? flash=false>.

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Gettysburg Address by Abraham Lincoln 1863

"Four score and seven years ago our fathers brought forth, upon this continent, a new nation, conceived in liberty, and dedicated to the proposition that "all men are created equal"

Now we are engaged in a great civil war, testing whether that nation, or any nation so conceived, and so dedicated, can long endure. We are met on a great battle field of that war. We have come to dedicate a portion of it, as a final resting place for those who died here, that the nation might live. This we may, in all propriety do. But, in a larger sense, we can not dedicate -- we can not consecrate -- we can not hallow, this ground-- The brave men, living and dead, who struggled here, have hallowed it, far above our poor power to add or detract. The world will little note, nor long remember what we say here; while it can never forget what they did here.

It is rather for us, the living, we here be dedicated to the great task remaining before us -- that, from these honored dead we take increased devotion to that cause for which they here, gave the last full measure of devotion -- that we here highly resolve these dead shall not have died in vain; that the nation, shall have a new birth of freedom, and that government of the people by the people for the people, shall not perish from the earth" (Lincoln).