Nowadays essay writing is one of the most widely used ways to assess the quality of a student’s knowledge and their ability to think critically. At the same time, such assignments are often troublesome for those who do not like doing them or feel like they lack proper writing skills to get a high grade. That is the reason why we decided to create this guide for you to stop worrying about your writing and your final grade, and make the whole process easier.
Prepare your working place
If you thought that the successful writing process starts with sitting down and starting typing your thoughts, that’s not how it works. The first thing you have to do is tidying up your table or even a corner of the room. “Why is this important?”, you may wonder. The matter is that when you have a mess around it is highly likely you have a mess inside your mind.
Therefore, make sure everything that has nothing to do with your current assignment is removed from your table. Take away all papers, notebooks, and other literature unless it’s needed for your writing. Check whether you get enough light so that your eyes will not get tired soon. When it’s done, sit down and you will notice how easy it is for you to concentrate now.
Don’t be hungry
One more crucial part of your preparation for any tough task, including writing an extensive academic essay, is being fed up before you start working. Of course, you should not gorge yourself with everything you can find in your refrigerator. Instead, be sure to eat enough to have a light feeling in your stomach.
Remember to check the quality of the food you eat. It should not be junk food you have bought on the way to your campus. Let it be a fair breakfast with eggs, meat or bacon, beans, and a lot of salad. Your brain work will be much more productive when you get enough proteins, so don’t overlook them in your menu.
Manage your time
When you have eaten well and cleaned your space, review your task and understand how much time you need to write it using your previous experience. As all of us tend to overestimate our capacities, remind yourself of the last time you have done a similar assignment and the time you spent on it. Don’t hope to write a 15-page research paper in one night as you will fail unless you are going to use the fast essay writing service that will do everything for you.
Create an outline
After you have estimated the time for carrying out the task, it’s time to divide it into parts to know what exact steps you need to make to get the job done. Trust us, it is more effective to do this step right after you’ve prepared for writing instead of asking around: “Please, help write my essay, anyone”.
When you start chopping your assignment into small, easy-to-understand pieces, your brain stops stressing out about the amount of the work to be done and does not perceive it as something unachievable anymore. Also, an outline helps you not to deviate from your thesis statement while writing.
Write essay body first
It’s recommended for everyone who has little experience of writing college-level essays to write the body paragraphs first. It will help you concentrate on providing the evidence to your argument gradually without thinking of how to begin the essay for now. When you have written them entirely, review the text and make sure it correlates with your argument in a certain way depending on the type of your essay.
Create a strong introduction and conclusion
After your essay body is done, think of the way you would like to open your essay and finish it. Remember that these parts of the writing process should imply the same thoughts, but cannot repeat each other directly.
A good introduction is the one that starts with a joke, a quote or a fact that will grab the attention of your audience. Don’t forget to present your thesis statement here too.
Your conclusion should be laconic and certain as it is the last chance to present your position regarding the topic of your essay. No additional information can be presented here.
Have a rest
When you have finished your writing, let yourself have a rest. Take a walk to fill your brain with oxygen and change the setting. Some physical activity in the open air will be more useful in this case.
Also, do not forget about taking breaks while writing. Use them to drink some fresh juice, do a couple of exercises, and air the room. It will help you keep up your energy and not get exhausted very quickly.
Proofread your essay
Before you submit your paper to your professor, you need to make a few more steps. First, read your essay aloud. You may even ask your friends at this stage to help you. They may be surprised to hear: “I need your help not to write my essay but to listen to it”.
The matter is that the grammar, punctuation, and lexical mistakes are more noticeable when the text is delivered to someone verbally, not just read. After that, remember to correct typos if you notice any and revise some sentences if you feel like they don’t sound well enough.
Pay attention to formatting
When all the work with text is finished, go on to the formatting of your essay. Find the last edition of the style that you were assigned to use, be it APA, MLA or Chicago. Remember to check whether all quotes are inserted properly so that your professor would not suspect plagiarism in your essay.
Submit it and get over it
Once the work is done, it’s time to pass it to your instructor and calm down. Now, you have done the best you could to receive a good grade so there is no point worrying about your assignment anymore. Praise yourself and don’t stress even if you have found some mistakes after you have submitted your work for assessment.
Academic essay writing might be a tough work to do, but only until you don’t know where to start. We hope our tips will make this process more interesting and less troublesome for you. Feel free to share this guide with your friends so that they could start writing academic essays better too.