When your draft is complete, all you can think about is finishing your work as quickly as possible, right? But there is so much left to do! Well, with the help of our tips, you can polish and finalize your paper without spending too much time. How? Read this article!
1. Have a Little Break
When working on your assignment for a long time, it’s easy to become tired and heedless. It’s not surprising, as your brain is overloaded with all the wording, creativity, and analysis. It’s hard to switch to another task, so your brain needs some time to rest.
Even if you don’t have much time, a five-minute break will work. Watch a video, listen to music, have a snack, etc. Meanwhile, your brain will have a little time to relax too. After that, you will see that it’s easier to continue working on your essay. Check out what other tricks on how to become a more productive student we were writing about.
2. Check if Your Paper Meets the Requirements
This step is not only about checking the word count (although you should) but also other qualities of your essay. For example, check the assignment to find out if you did everything that was required. Did you answer the question posed? Did you explain, analyze, or compare what you were supposed to?
Then, check the word count and formatting guides (we also have a great article about differnet citation styles that you might find very helpful). These requirements are crucial to meet in order to get a high grade, as these are the first things that your professor or teacher will pay attention to. Not meeting them can badly affect your grade even if the content of your essay is pretty good.
3. Pay Attention to the Style and Content Quality
Even if you have reached the minimum word count (check the article on how to lengthen your essay if you haven’t), it doesn’t mean that the content of your essay is good enough. Read through your text and pay attention to the structure of your sentences and paragraphs. Edit sentences that seem unclear or have any style errors. For example, there are general rules applied to any academic work, such as:
- Using the active voice instead of passive
- Avoiding slang, contractions, and exaggerations
- Avoiding repetition and complicated wording
- Explaining terms used in your essay
- Keeping the number of quotes used reasonable
- Using transitions between paragraphs to avoid making sharp jumps
- Avoiding facts and data that don’t have a reliable source.
Reread your text several times to make sure you have covered all the facts that you intended and created a logical flow that leads your reader through the topic. There should be no ‘sharp edges’ that one can usually see in the works that have a bad structure. In such a case, the author jumps from one fact or subtopic to another, sometimes coming back and repeating themselves. Make sure to elaborate your thoughts in an easy-to-understand manner and use transition sentences when moving from one paragraph to another.
Also:
- Check if your essay has words like ‘bad,’ ‘good,’ etc. It’s better to replace them will less widespread and banal words. You can use online synonym tools like Thesaurus to pick the most suitable words for your piece.
- Avoid using too complicated and fancy words as they usually don’t add any value to your essay and may make you look less creative and genuine.
- Make sure you keep your work easy to read – say ‘no’ to complicated constructions and long sentences because they make it easier to miss a punctuation error and harder to follow your point.
If you see that the content and style look fine, you can take the next step.
4. Check the Grammar
Flawless grammar is essential in order to get a high grade. Even if you conduct in-depth research and put much time into the analysis, poor grammar can ruin all your effort.
First of all, you can use the grammar checker that is embedded in your word processor. Of course, it’s not totally reliable, as it may not recognize errors due to its inability to work with the context in which the words are used. It might also miss typos or commas.
The next level of check is to put your essay through a grammar checker like Grammarly. They are highly popular and develop each year to let you check the flow and clarity of your pieces as well as grammar and punctuation. It is more context-oriented, so it will let you know about the mistakes that your software has missed.
The last step would be to run your essay through the plagiarism-checking software. Even if you didn’t copy any part of your text from other sources, your piece might contain similar parts to already existing pieces. Of course, your professor or teacher will not always check your essay for plagiarism, but it’s always good to be confident about the quality of your work