What is Plagiarism?
According to JCU Academic Policies, plagiarism is any use of another's ideas, words, or created product without crediting the source.
The MLA Handbook states that using another person's ideas, information, or expressions without acknowledging that person's work constitutes intellectual theft. Passing off another person's ideas, information, or expressions as your own to get a better grade or gain some other advantage constitutes fraud.
How to Avoid It
To avoid plagiarism, you must give credit whenever you use:
another person's idea, opinion, or theory
any piece of information that is not common knowledge
quotations of another person's actual spoken or written words
More tips for avoiding plagiarism:
Put in quotations everything that comes directly from the text, and be sure to write down the words exactly as they are written.
Paraphrase, but be sure you are not just rearranging or replacing a few words.