Tips for Students for Better Writing

In the business world, excellent writing is one of the most essential and useful skills. However, it is also one of the rarest and most undervalued skills among students. If you are a student, whether you enjoy writing or not, there’s probably a fair amount of it that you need to do as a student. Writing is not most students’ favorite thing to do, especially essay compositions. But did you know that picking up your writing skills, aside from making your grades better, can also help advance your ability to think and explain even the most difficult topics?

If you can find a lot of tips to become motivated to study, there are also many useful tips that you can see when it comes to improving your writing skills. If you’re a student who’s having a challenging time when it comes to completing writing tasks and activities, you’re in the right place. Today, we will give you some of the best tips for students for better writing.

Create a timeline to finish your writing tasks

The problem with students is that they start writing their papers the day or even the night before the deadline. Some students might even say that they write better that way. But believe us when we say that they don’t. There’s a reason instructors and professors give assignments or writing tasks at the beginning of the semester. And that is so you can have enough time to plan, research, write, and revise your paper. Therefore, when you take advantage of that time, aside from producing a better paper, you will also be free from stress and will not lose a night of sleep on the due date.

What we can advise is to create a timeline or schedule at the beginning of the semester. For example, you can set the first two weeks for research, another two weeks for writing, and the remaining weeks to revise and proofread. Writing a little bit each day, around 500 words, can go a long way during your writing.

Create an outline before writing

person holding a mug while writing on a notebook

If you want to be outstanding in journaling, planning is the key. Keep in mind that there’s no successful writer who does not plan his work before writing. Not all writers use traditional formal outline that contains roman numerals, capital letters, etc. But creating an outline is one of the best ways to plan what you are going to write. It can be a mind map that contains a list of points that you are going to cover, the purpose of your writing, and the mental image of your paper.

With the advancement of technology, there are many tools you can use to create an outline for your paper. In fact, there are now a lot of educational technologies used by universities and students. That’s why it’s not going to be challenging for you to outline. Remember that your plan should tell what you are going to talk about and how you are going to do it. It also contains what you can expect to find in the rest of the paper.

Aside from helping you start writing, an outline can also help you monitor your writing. You can use it as a ruler to measure your progress as you write. And when you get stuck, it also offers writing prompts. And most importantly, it helps keep you focused on the goals that you’ve set for your paper, compared to setting goals as you write.

Try to start in the middle if you find writing the introduction challenges

For many students and writers, writing an introduction is one of the most challenging parts of the composition. Instead of staring at a blank screen until you run out of time, you can skip the introduction and start writing a paragraph or two about your topic. Keep in mind that you can always come back and write the introduction when you’re done writing the body.

Write drafts

Writing drafts can also help in writing better. Once the ideas pour in your mind, make sure that you write them all down. Don’t mind the grammatical errors that you will make because you can fix your mistakes later. The purpose of writing a draft is to secure the ideas that you have for your paper. Do not focus on the rules and formatting, but write. What you write in your draft does not matter, and what you rewrite is what’s important.

Never plagiarize

Remember when writing a paper at school or even writing a blog on your website, do not copy phrases from other sources without including a reference about where you got that idea. It is just like summarizing the argument or works of other people or using their data without permission. Therefore, never include anything in your works that is not your original thought. If you want to add an idea that came from another writer, make sure that you include a line that points to where it came from.

person using a laptop while writing on a notebook

Also, remember that you need to keep citations minimal. If your paper is composed of quotes and paraphrases that came from the works of other people, even when all of them are properly cited, it will still not be a good paper.

Make sure to follow directions

If your professor gave you requirements or instructions on how to write or format your papers, make sure that you follow all of them. Please keep all of them, especially when you are a beginner in your professor’s class, or it’s your first time doing a writing task. Sometimes, professors ask students to come up with 8 to 10 pages not because he wants to make you suffer in creating a long write up, but because he thinks that you can’t write less than eight pages for your topic. No matter how long the requirement is, remember that every paper should be exactly as long as it needs to be relevant.

Aside from the number of words or pages, make sure that you are following the proper format for your paper. This can include the font style, font size, spaces, indentions, and more. It’s because aside from the content of your paper, these things will also affect your grade.

Always proofread your work

Proofreading is essential once you finish writing your paper. It is different from revision. You need to pay attention to your grammar, spelling, and punctuation. You can use online tools to check for errors if you are not confident about proofreading your work. You can also ask other people to read your work and see if they find mistakes that you can correct.

These are some of the tips that we can share with students for better writing. Remember that the best way for you to improve your writing is always to practice writing. We hope that these tips will help you in completing all your writing tasks in school.