Do you think your writing skills need to be better? Maybe writing is your real passion and now you think it’s time to improve it?
There are some tips a lot of writers use to write an excellent essay:
Structure your thoughts
Your readers won’t enjoy reading one page of a solid text because it sounds boring. You want to make your paper readable for other people. So it will be better to break your essay down into smaller pieces.
Start with creating an outline or a plan for your essay. It’s better if you can write down all the discuss questions you want to mention in your paper.
Essay structure looks like this:
- Introduction
Let the reader know what the paper is about. You need to write down all the the main points which you are going to include into the essay. - Body
In this part you need to discuss your arguments. Don’t include more than one idea in the paragraph. Keep the structure clear. For one main point you should use one paragraph. - Conclusion
Summarize your main points. Sum up all the information. To make sure you’ve answered all the questions you planned, read your paper introduction again.
Prove your arguments
In the body, you will need to start proving your arguments. You should start with doing research. Find current academic literature to include enough sources in the paper. Never use unreliable sources! It will be better to access your college database and get some information that will be useful for the research. Don’t forget to cite all the ideas you took from such articles.
To prove your argument you will need to recap what others said about this idea. Show some real examples – it can be a fact from history or you can use someone’s quote. You should also explain why your point in this paragraph means a lot for the question. If your idea has a great impact on your research question, explain why and how it is important.
Start Proofreading Only After You Finish the Whole Paper
You don’t need to worry about some grammar mistakes or problems with correct spelling. You’ll be able to focus on that later. Don’t even try to edit your text just after you wrote it. It will only make you forget your main points, when you lose your concentration.
So once you’re done with the paper, it’s better to relax. If you start checking the paper for mistakes right away, it will be a challenge to even find any. But after a break you can start over. First, you’ll need to read your essay and make sure it’s clear for the reader. Check if you proved your main arguments and made an understandable conclusion.
Now you can focus on the next step! Proofread your paper by checking every sentence carefully to notice all the possible errors. It’s a time consuming and boring task but you’ll be amazed how much you will have changed in the paper.
Don’t Rush
Most of the students wait till the last day to write their class assignments. Maybe students are sure they can work under pressure much better. But instead you might end up having tons of spelling and stylistic mistakes. And you won’t have enough time for editing!
It would be perfect if you finish the essay one day in advance. You’ll be able to leave it and then reread it once again later. This way you will notice all the clichés and mistakes in your work.
Ask For Feedback
It would be great if an editor could read your paper before you submit it. You can give it to someone who could provide constructive comments. You’ll have a possibility to improve some parts of the paper which were hard to understand for other people. You can paraphrase that fragments and your essay will become clear.
After submission, you can ask your professor for feedback. You can’t improve your writing without solid understanding of your writing problems. Sometimes it’s really hard to realize why you got a lower grade than you expected.
So, the formula for A+ essay writing is:
- Write an outline.
- Check the structure.
- Prove your arguments.
- Cite your sources of ideas.
- Proofread the essay.
- Ask for someone’s feedback.
And of course you should practice more and more. Polish your skills and you’ll notice the improvement.
Let us know if you have your own formula for great writing – share it with us in the comments section!