Books, books, books!

The kiddo is a reader. I am thrilled she is a reader. I was not as a child until I discovered "The Babysitters Club" in second grade. I read those faithfully.

I am struggling though with good books for her to read. We have read many of what I consider to be the classics. Charlotte's Web, Stuart Little, some of the Little House Series. Those were books seriously lacking in my childhood, that I love as an adult.

Yesterday she came home with Diary of a Wimpy Kid. I was not sure what to think. The title alone was a put off. While the reading is easy for her, what about the content. I have spent the better half of the morning trying to decide if this is something she should be reading or not.

So how do you decide what your children should read, what is appropriate? What crosses the line?

Did you know......

Remember way back when you would save your college papers, speeches, essays, etc.... and recycle them, or "loan" them to a friend for rewording, or gasp, REUSE?

Come to find out in our great age of technology this may not be an option any more! Can you believe this? I found out in class last night that professors are now scanning in student papers into databases and checking to see if they match other papers in there. One site called Turnitin.com is doing this now! While I have never blatantly reused the same paper word for word over again, I have taken my own work and revamped it to fit a new assignment.

While I understand the need for students to create unique and original work for each class, after all you are there to learn, it just seems like this could be taking it a bit far. I feel that it is a wonderful tool to check for plagiarism, but my question is... can you be punished for plagiarizing yourself?

To quote one of my favorite professors syllabus.... it's my intellectual property... you can not use it.