Students are often asked to explain, describe or discuss what they have learned, and often this is done by writing. The first frame below is a presentation exploring how to describe cause-effect and some pitfalls students commonly fall into.
Describing what you learn can be dangerous, however, if you are not aware of, or do not follow, guidelines on plagiarism. Download these great resources (shoot; I wrote one of them myself!) or visit these shepherding sites.
The Private Eye©
The Private Eye is a simple, brilliant teaching tool to train students to look closely at objects, think about analogies and write descriptively.
This brief YouTube video contains snapshots of student work and teacher testimonials of its effectiveness.
See examples of student work resulting from training and use of The Private Eye teaching. The image below, created by a middle school student, comes from this gallery.
If you are interested, download this informational brochure from The Private Eye website.
Plagiarism-U of Toronto
If you are going to work hard at writing, don't sabotage your own work with plagiarism: the kiss of death, or hemlock for writers.
Plagiarism-WISC
Don't euthenize your own writing - be original and credit the owners of the shoulders you are standing on!