Are you still worried that you can’t get the desired marks or satisfactory results for your Academic Writing essays? Here, we propose 10 tips to help you improve your academic writing. These tips may seem ordinary, but if you pay attention to them, they can improve the quality of your essays.
Read and follow your assignment guidelines carefully
This is important and often overlooked. Before starting any writing assignment, take the time to review the assignment guidelines again. Professors provide assignment guidelines for a reason, and carefully reading and following the information your professor provides you with for your coursework will help you tremendously with your academic writing essays.
Using the right academic paper format
Once you have carefully studied the assignment guidelines, you will want to choose the correct format for your academic paper based on your professor’s guidelines. This is important because before people read your paper, they will look at the format. Incorrect formatting looks sloppy. A sloppy paper is like wearing a dirty t-shirt and torn jeans to a job interview. It creates a terrible first impression.
Follow these basic principles to make your paper look professional:
- Use a standard font and size (usually Times New Roman 12)
- Set one-inch margins on all sides.
- Use double space or double space according to your professor’s requirements.
Mastering the structure of academic essay writing
It may sound simple, but if you are writing an academic paper, remember to use the right structure for your paper.
All formal essays require an original title, which lets the reader know what your essay is about, a strong topic, one or more introductory paragraphs, and a summary conclusion. A strong paper has at least a few body paragraphs explaining the key points of the paper, and one or more concluding paragraphs summarizing it. A proper understanding of the structure of an academic essay will provide you with a solid foundation for your academic writing.
Narrowing the topic of your academic writing (AW) essay appropriately
Writing about a broad topic may mean that you have a lot of information you can put into an essay to meet the length requirements. However, it may also mean that you are writing a simple essay on a complex topic. This can be lengthy and tiresome for your professor and will not capture the attention of the viewer.
To write engaging essays, narrow your topic to focus on smaller, more specific issues. This approach will allow you to write more detailed and effective essays, and it will also allow viewers (especially professors) to focus more on your topic rather than feeling overwhelmed by the entire essay.
Write a rough draft first
Pre-writing is also an important step, and many people (you may be one of them) hate pre-writing because they think it takes up too much time.
While prewriting does take time and effort, it helps you organize your ideas and sort out your thoughts before you actually start. All of this organizing and sorting out builds up in the long run to the point where you’ll actually save time when you write your main draft because you’ll be more prepared when you write your main draft.
Choose your vocabulary carefully when writing
The choice of vocabulary is equally important when it comes to academic writing. A recent trend in academic writing is the use of advanced digital tools to enhance vocabulary selection, ensuring the tone remains professional and appropriate for academic settings. You should try to avoid using a lot of repetitive vocabulary, and you should also be careful to avoid overusing long and complex diction. The tone of your vocabulary should be appropriate for academic writing, and by this I mean word choices that contribute to your credibility. And create a professional tone of words Choosing the right words to convey your tone can improve the professor’s impression of your Academic Writing (AW) essay.
Use concise and cohesive sentences
When writing academically, you should try to use concise and cohesive statements and avoid unnecessarily long sentence types. Adding a bunch of words can help you get an immediate word count, but more words don’t always equal better writing.
Writing in the third person
Many types of writing – such as narrative essays, columns, and blogs – allow (and often prefer) the use of first or even second person point of view.
However, most academic papers, such as research papers and literary analysis papers, require more formality and therefore require you to write in the third person. This will make your Academic Writing (AW) essay look more professional.
Use reliable evidence to support the argument of the essay
Academic Writing is more than just saying exactly what you think, so you need to use reliable evidence and some external data to support your argument. Remember, you want your readers to know that you have done your research and you want them to think you are credible. Citing authorities and experts to support your argument is essential to achieving this credibility. However, you should also be careful to avoid extensive use of external citations, as overuse of them can make your essay seem too empty. Also when you choose external data, make sure you choose reliable sources such as scholarly articles or academic journals.
Revise and touch up your finished draft over and over again
In most cases, one revision is not enough, so be sure to save time and revise at least twice. Set your paper aside for a day or two and then go over your paper again to make sure you have a clear thesis, topic sentence, and supporting evidence. Finally, touch up your paper. Look for grammatical errors and any spelling or word choice mistakes (such as incorrect use of they/them in/there or too/to/both). Also check for punctuation, formatting and citation errors.
These are the 10 tips we have given you on Academic Writing (AW) articles and we hope all goes well with your writing!
