Citing and referencing are critical in higher education, but some students might even be asked to do them in high school or middle school. This is because students need to show where they took the information they used in their work. You must credit the source if you want to quote someone or use someone’s ideas or research results.
You could be accused of plagiarism if you don’t cite and reference correctly. This can often be unintentional plagiarism, especially if you misuse in-text citations. You need to use a plagiarism checker to catch unintentional plagiarism, but some forms may not be as easily checked through the plagiarism database. This is why proper citing and referencing are so important in the first place.