While essay writing does come naturally to some people, these people are few and far between. For many of us, essay writing is a skill that we need to learn. A particularly difficult skill too. This is a huge shame because, for many courses that we can study for, we are judged just as much on our writing skills as our understanding of the course materials. On this page, we want to share with you a few tips for improving your essay writing. These are basic tips, but we do hope that they stimulate a few ideas for you.
Know what you are writing about
This is vital when it comes to essay writing. If you don’t know what you are supposed to be writing about, how are you supposed to put together a quality essay? Before you start planning or write a single word, go through that essay question and find out what is required of you. This will guide your research and planning stages. After all, if you are meant to write an argumentative essay, should you really be planning to do a review essay?
Plan your essay before you write it
You will be surprised at how much people forget about this absolutely crucial point. If you just jump into writing an essay without a care in the world, then you are going to get a terrible mark. The bulk of your time writing an essay will come from planning. This means doing a lot of research. Since you will already know what you are writing about, the research stage should be fluid. Through your education, you will have a rough idea about what the main areas of discussion are, but do not be afraid to branch off if you want the higher marks. Just make sure that all of your research remains focused. Or just order your college paper at Copycrafter and a high grade is guaranteed.
Jot down as many ideas as you possibly can during the research stages. We doubt that you are going to be able to cover everything that you write down, but put the ideas onto paper anyway. You may use them. If anything, they may stimulate new ideas for you to think about. Don’t forget to ensure that you record all the information about the study or book you are reading. You will need it for your citations.
Once you have done your research, you can start to organize your essay a little bit. Plan your introduction, the content of the essay, and the conclusion. The structure won’t be set in stone yet, but you will need to have a rough idea about the route you are planning to take. It will make the writing process a lot easier.
Write the essay several times
Well. OK. You won’t be deleting everything and starting again, but if you want to improve your essay writing skills, then you will need to learn how to edit. The students that get the highest marks are the ones that are ruthless with their editing. Go through the essay you are writing. If something makes no sense or doesn’t answer the question, then make sure you trim it out. Fill the space with useful information. The more useful information you have packed into the essay, the more marks you will get on it.
Obviously, you will want to be paying attention to your spelling and grammar too. For this, you may want to use Grammarly or similar software. It functions a lot better than the tools that are built into the standard Word Processor.
Read comments after your essays have been marked
Haven’t you got the grade you want? Don’t worry. You can use that essay as a learning experience. It doesn’t matter what skill you are trying to improve, you need to look at your past failures as a learning tool. Go through the comments. Find out where you went wrong. Make sure that you do not make the same mistake again. Most students make the mistake of only reading the mark. If you do this, then you will forever be condemning yourself to low grades.
Honestly, if you follow these tips, then we promise that your essay writing skills will improve. It will be a slow process, though. Just make sure that you work hard, and the good grades will come.
