One of the activities that college students dread is writing an academic essay. While academic essays carry a lot of marks, most learners don’t do their best. Essay writing requires a lot of time and energy. You need to develop your writing skills and adhere to all the guidelines to get good grades. If you’ve been wondering how you can excel in this field, we are here to help you. We’ve compiled 12 simple tips that you can use to improve your essay writing skills and achieve your academic goals in the long run.
Table of Contents
1. Choose a good topic
In college, the professor can either assign you a specific topic or allow you to choose one for yourself. If the professor has assigned a specific topic, you should focus on writing a high-quality paper and getting good grades. If the tutor hasn’t assigned a topic, you need to conduct thorough research to find a topic that you are passionate about. Define what you want to achieve. When you set clear goals, you’ll easily find the topics that interest you. Regardless of the type of essay or topic, ensure that you get involved in the process. This is one of the best ways to improve the essay writing process.
2. Create your outline
Creating an outline will not only help you cover the most important topics of your essay but also save you a lot of time and energy in the long run. An outline will help you organize your essay around what you want to discuss. A simple description will determine the topic of your essay and build valid points. The outline should include an intro, body, and conclusion.
3. Have a strong thesis statement
Your thesis statement acts as the pillar of your essay. When you choose a specific thesis, you’ll develop arguments that support your main idea. The statement should be clear, logical, and debatable. Otherwise, you’ll have a hard time supporting it with strong arguments.
4. Research extensively
When writing an academic essay, research is essential. Your research acts as the foundation of your essay. Therefore, you need to conduct in-depth research to support your arguments. Whenever you come up with a point, ensure that there is enough evidence to support it. Extensive research on the topic is one of the best ways to improve your writing process. Thanks to rapid technological advancement, you don’t have to spend hours in the library reading books, journals, and encyclopedias. With your computer and smartphone, you can research extensively or find an essay writer helper in the comfort of your home.
5. Use the right vocabulary
You need to use the right vocabulary when writing an academic paper. The purpose of writing an essay is to convince people that you are knowledgeable about the topic. Don’t use big words wrongly in a bid to sound smart. The use of ambiguous words will confuse your readers. Simplicity is key.
6. Use the appropriate sentence structure
Your essay needs to have a wide range of sentence lengths for it to cover different concepts smoothly. Using a lot of short sentences will make your essay look congested. Use long and short sentences from the intro to the conclusion.
7. Learn about grammar, punctuation, and style
For your audience to understand what you are talking about and take you seriously, you need to know more about grammar, punctuation, and style. You should have a clear understanding of pronouns, verbs, sentence structure, and subject agreement. To improve the effectiveness of your essay, use passive voice. Using simple language is one of the best ways to make your essay clear and readable.
8. Read other peoples’ essays
One of the best ways to become a great writer is by reading regularly. Reading other peoples’ essays will help you learn more about the structures and styles that you should use. Read a wide range of essays on different topics. Plus, don’t hesitate to seek help from the experts. There are a lot of essay experts that you can find online and hire at an affordable price to help you get the work done.
9. Avoid using informal expressions
Since you are writing an academic paper, you should avoid using slang and other types of informal expressions. Writing your paper in the third person will enable readers to respond to your arguments on a higher level.
10. Write a solid conclusion
A good essay should be strong from the intro to the conclusion. Most people don’t invest a lot of energy in the conclusion. Yet, most readers will go through this section to determine whether they’ll read the entire paper. You should summarize your arguments quickly and show how they add to your thesis statement. You shouldn’t allow your essay to end badly.
11. Include a reference page
The reference page is one of the most important sections in your essay. Regardless of the format, you are using, this section should be easy to read and well organized for your readers to see where you got your information. When you fail to include a reference page, you will get poor grades due to plagiarism. Plagiarism is the act of submitting an individual’s work as your own without proper acknowledgment.
12. Proofread your essay
After writing your essay, you need to proofread it. Go through the different forms of sentences and identify mistakes in spelling and grammar. Using a reputable grammar checker such as Grammarly or hiring someone to do the work for you will help you submit a high-quality paper.
Conclusion
Writing a good essay is not a walk in the park. However, using these twelve tips will make your work easier. Read regularly and write every day to improve your skills and get good grades.
