XplanaZine

When it comes to online teaching and learning, one of the biggest concerns is cheating. How can I know if the student taking a test or completing a composition is really the student who is supposed to be doing the work? How can I prevent unsupervised students from cheating on their online assignments and quizzes?
The questions are legitimate as cheating has long been a concern in education — from elementary schools to universities. So, while plagiarism, false identities, and good-old-fashioned cheating off your neighbor are not unique to the online world, we have not yet developed models that make us feel very comfortable about the physical separation between students and teachers in the virtual classroom.
Perhaps the models we’re looking for, however, are no further away than the technology being used in the anti-spam wars. Recently, companies have begun fighting spam by developing automated approaches for distinguishing humans from computers. These automated approaches are called “reverse Turing tests,” or captchas—short for the more descriptive “completely automated public Turing test to tell computers and humans apart.” hat’s driving research on captchas is the realization that a lot of spam is being sent out by automatons: if you can somehow tell the difference between an unattended computer program and one that’s driven by a human, you can block the spam while letting through legitimate e-mail.
The use of automatons pretending to be human is not so different, really, from students enlisting other humans to assume their identity for an assignment or test. The problems become the same — how to determine if the right person or right kind of entity is generating a message or response.
Following the model of the reverse Turing tests used for fighting spam, here are some possible pieces to a workable solution for curbing online cheating and creating a comfort level in teachers for this medium of instruction.

• Require students to prove they’re human. No, I’m not joking, although I am probably sympathetic with some of your objections regarding particular students Just as the captchas used by anti-spammers require senders to prove their basic humanity, it is simple to include in any assignment or quiz a short component that requires a show of real identity without necessarily adding to the workload of the teacher.
• Require students to show they are the right human. This is really an extension of number one and it is where our model differs from the traditional captchas. On our assignments and quizzes we are very interested in specific identity so it is important that this component of an assignment or quiz be more than identifying a fuzzy word or writing out a name or password. Here are a couple of suggestions:
  • Have students attach a voice file. This is relatively simple (I have done this with a wide range of students and had good success) and is both an effective deterrent and a good way to get to know your students better.
  • Give a more thorough Turing test by asking students a written question that requires spontaneous and personal information. This can produce the same results as the first example.
• Through the duration of a course, require students to provide a complete picture of who they really are. We all know and agree that it is impossible for a student we really know to cheat in our classes effectively. In fact, when they have to present themselves to us fully, they are very reluctant to even try. I accomplish this through journaling (graded only as completed or not) while I have friends who accomplish the same thing via group projects and other Web publishing assignments.

The point is that our goal should be to create environments which deter cheating — I doubt we will ever eliminate it in education. And the key to creating a strong deterrent is to develop systems that make us feel reasonably secure, and that provide us with security similar to what we have in the classroom. When we do this we will have made important advances.
Ultimately, however, we must remember to use the Web in teaching for both of the two things it does best — automation and individualization (a weird paradox). We should continue to automate testing in order to provide us as teachers more precious time to spend with or students in individualized instruction. Perhaps the captchas from the ongoing anti-spam efforts will provide us with the model of comfort we need to keep moving forward.