7 Tips To Write Fabulous Essays In College

Though controversial, it’s common for college students to only pay attention to their grades instead of their work’s quality. Think about it. When you get an exam or other graded assignment back from your teacher, your first and last concern is your total score. However, you also need to review and improve upon your mistakes.

Essay writing might be a tough road to traverse, but it allows students to improve their writing endeavors continually. One drawback of regular essay writing is that you might get used to repeating the same patterns/techniques every time you sit down to write. And it’s easy to get stuck in this vicious cycle if you’re high on positive feedback from your teachers.

So, is there a surefire technique to guarantee brilliance in academic writing? The key to writing better is understanding your teacher’s scoring criteria and then following them like divine scripture. Down below, we provide some beneficial tips and practices that will help you write exceptional essays and impress your teachers with each submission.

1. Create A Thesis

Developing a thesis sets the tone for your essay, defines the essential points, and gives an idea about your claims. You may refer to it as the central idea or theme for the following paragraphs of your essay.

Typically, thesis statements comprise a few sentences in your introduction. A thesis helps clarify your stance on a given topic. Remember, most teachers will judge the rest of your essay paragraphs on how well they support the thesis statement.

2. Follow Writing Conventions

What do we mean by conventions? Well, these include proper grammar, sentence structure, punctuation, and spelling. It’s not a good look if your essay is riddled with mistakes because it weakens your arguments and reduces your credibility as a writer.

Besides, your writing can become incomprehensible if you make too many minor errors. Surely, you don’t want your teacher to ignore your exceptionally critical arguments because of poor spelling now, do you? If you’re considering enrolling in literature degrees like a BA in English online, this tip can help immensely.

3. Focus On The Tone Of Voice

All struggling students, listen here! The best way to hone your writing skills is to write in an active voice. But what does active voice mean? An active voice implies that the sentence’s subject does not receive the action but performs it instead.

To get rid of the passive voice from your writing, avoid using “to be” verbs and following them with past participles. It would also help to consider asking who or what is performing the action. Then, you can move that subject before the verb and, if need be, make other changes.

4. Start Strong To Finish Strong

You can quickly evaluate a writer’s skill based on how well they organize their essay. For instance, good essays will be in a logical order. Always prioritize a clear format.

Ensure your introductory paragraph transitions smoothly to your body paragraphs, and your conclusion puts everything else in perspective. It’s an excellent idea to develop a writing outline before you start, as it will help you stay on track.

Once you finish, you can review this outline to check if there’s a natural flow between your ideas. Some helpful considerations include checking the logical order of paragraphs, the order of sentences inside each section, and the connections/transitions between the paragraphs.

5. Conclude Well

An often overlooked yet integral aspect of essay writing is the conclusion. The conclusion acts as the main link to bring everything together while proving your thesis. Although it could restate your thesis, try not to make it too identical to your introduction or thesis. A concrete conclusion will summarize the key points and evidence of the body paragraphs.

Next, it will connect the proof to your thesis. Lastly, it will elaborate on how this evidence proves your research’s argument. It’s a shame when a truly excellent essay gets thrown off by an unclear and poorly-structured conclusion.

6. Provide Good References

The last step of college essay evaluation consists of teachers checking your references. Therefore, try to extract research information from reliable sources, for example, books and websites. When using quotes and paraphrases for emphasis, always cite and credit the sources.

To ensure you’re good on this front, try the following: deliver proof of comprehensive research, support your main arguments with references, quotes, and examples. Also, you should use a suitable format for your citations, such as APA or MLA.

7. Proofread Your Work

As soon as you put your pen down or stop typing, pick up your glasses and get to proofreading. Start by examining the sentence structures and sniff out any spelling and grammatical errors. If you wish, you can use one of the many digital writing assistance tools available online. It’s also a great practice to read your essay aloud and see if everything sounds harmonious.

Proofreading can help detect any passive voice usage and if your sentences are engaging. Close friends and academic advisors can also assist you by providing advice and feedback on your essay.

Moreover, there’s no shame in rewriting parts of your essay if you don’t deem them up to your standards. For the majority, writing college essays is an art that takes a while to master.

To Put It Briefly

By far, the most raging question among any college community is “how to improve writing skills?” There’s no denying that academic scores or grades matter, but they shouldn’t be your sole focus if you want to refine your writing.

This article went over some helpful tips to enhance your academic writing skills. These involve developing a thesis, following conventions, and providing references. If you heed the guidance in these tips, you’ll be able to up your essay-writing game in no time!