Posted on 11/14/2005 4:38:45 PM PST by roostercogburn
My 14 year old son has been given a project to design a memorial to the fallen soldiers of the Iraq war. It must be designed as though it will be built on the Mall in Washington D.C. which means it must follow the same design restrictions that applied to the Vietnam Memorial. It must Honor the memory of those who served and those who gave their lives. Be harmonious with the Mall and its surroundings. Somehow fit into the "historic continuity" of American art. Be durable, buildable and not hard to maintain. Please , any ideas would be appreciated.
I am not sure whether you are cheating for your daughter, but it seems clear to me that rooster is cheating. And not just helping the kid as a parent, but getting a slice of the FR community to cheat too. So, rooster is cheating at cheating. There is no point to parents doing a kid's homework. Why do you want to repeat high school? This is what's wrong with the country--so we have no right to complain when some journalist gets caught plagiarizing--it looks like some FR parents think that is just fine when their own kids are involved. In the end, it is all self-defeating, because all children will have to stand on their own at some point. Those that just did the damn work themselves will be stronger, smarter, and certainly more self-reliant than the cheaters.
No one has suggested that children should not do the work themselves or that they should be encouraged to plagiarize. I wonder if you read my words carefully. I never suggested that anyone do the schoolwork for his child.
Do you have children? If you do, their teachers will tell you that it is essential for parents to participate in homework--talking about the assignment to make sure the child understands and completes it, giving feedback, answering questions, providing appropriate materials. How you get from that type of help to plagiarism is unclear. Kids learn better when their parents reinforce the material they encounter during the school day instead of simply abandoning them. Helping a child learn is very far from cheating.
All that's going on here is some brainstorming. The parent is trying to help the kid grow and mature in his view of the world. As long as the final decision for the design is the kid's, what's the problem?
Maybe there's a rod set in the floor and the gun slid over it.
Do check your spelling and grammar even though odds-on the teacher wouldn't know the difference.
too sensitive. :)
Neato. Looks like a great statue.
Your second paragraph has no bearing on what is going on here. Adults are being solicited to give the kid ideas for a design that the kid will pass off as his own. That is the essence of plagiarism--passing off as your own ideas that others came up with. Here's a thought experiment: what if rooster wrote for the teacher a short statement on how the kid did his homework, how the parent solicited a web community to get ideas. If I were the teacher, I would give the kid an F for cheating.
The brain that the storm belongs in is the kid's. "Brainstorming" of this kind is cheating, pure and simple. What if the teacher told each kid to write a short story. What if one kid's father was a Hollywood studio boss who got 15 professional screenwriters to "brainstorm" for the kid. Don't you think that this is an unfair advantage? What's the difference between what's going on here and the hypothetical?
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