Chapter 435 of "you can't make this stuff up"

Over the last 4 weeks my LA class was working on research papers. They were given a list of topics to choose from, and we worked in class, step by step, to complete the majority of the paper. They were given more than enough instruction on how to tackle each part of the paper. We completed the outlines, bibliographies, and did the research all in class. The only thing they were on their own for was the writing of the body of the paper. This was after they already had a graded outline to work from. All they had to do was plug the research IN THEIR OWN WORDS into the paper.

You know where I'm going with this, right?

As I was grading them over the weekend I found the occasional "slip-up" of something not being cited just right... I can look past that, obvious mistake, make notes on how it should be, and subtract a few points. Then I got to HIS paper. It was good. A little too good.

It was word for word off the website he INCLUDED in his bibliography. I mean, come on.... if your going to plagiarize, make me work for it a little... ya know really have to search for it. Don't point me directly to the page you stole it from.

So off to his guidance counselor I go, paper in hand, to have his parents called in for a conference. Well his mom tells the guidance counselor that I'm a liar, she watched and even helped him write the paper (really?) and she's not coming in. When she sees the grade on the paper she will decide weather or not to come in. Well yea lady, paper's an F. and it's worth 2 test grades. And I have the printed out website info that he cut and paste...

I mean come on, the kid used words like proponents and opponents, he added stats from the W.H.O. which I'm sure he has no clue even stands for the World He@lth Organiz@tion, he even included a sentence which stated "when I am in Europe..." that alone had me falling off my chair in laughter.

Here's a little insight to why this is all so VERY FUNNY:

Fast forward to today... They are given a writing task as a vocab quiz to write a story about a favorite toy coming to life using at least 12 of their vocabulary words correctly. (we had just finished reading the Nutcr@cker).

His paper was titled...

Wait for it....

Wait for it....

"Me and my Weenie"

Yup.... you read that correctly, and feel free to imagine what was included in that paper, you won't be too far off the mark.

This from the kid who uses the word proponent.

You can't make this stuff up!

Nighty night..