Steps for Revising an Essay
One of the essential steps of writing an essay is the revision and editing part. Though it is quite time-consuming, it still needs to be done with perfection so that enough time gets devoted for its revision. Most of the students get confused about the process of writing an essay, and they need some guidance on it. Here, in this blog, we have highlighted a few effective ways that can help you revise your essay appropriately.
You need to look at the essay as a whole. Make sure that the essay you write is able to achieve its purpose and objective, and the data and arguments presented in the essay must follow a logical order.
You need to analyze each paragraph separately and take a look at the sentences properly that can help contribute to the paragraph’s central idea. Your sentences must be able to make seamless transitions and must communicate all the key points.
The final most step is to check all the grammatical mistakes and punctuation errors. In the end, polish your essay so that its meaning is clear.
Look at the essay as a whole
The first step is to learn how to revise an essay. Your focus should be on the paragraphs that need to be reworked. Look for paragraphs that need to be removed from your essay; the ones with no sense are better to be removed. This is the reason why we need to move our approach from general to more specific. This way, you’ll be able to analyze the whole purpose and organization of your essay.
Purpose: Here, you need to check all the assignment requirements properly so that you do not miss any key points while writing. In simple terms, this means that you need to check if the essay you write is able to fulfill every requirement of your essay.
Organization: The next thing that you need to do is check the logical impression of your essay. Keep a check on all the paragraphs and sections of whether they are in order or not and what information they contain. Also, do not forget to answer the below-mentioned questions-
- Are all the terms, theories, and concepts defined before they are actually introduced?
- Are the arguments presented in a logical order?
- Have you provided the necessary background information before delving into the details?
- Does each paragraph follow a logical progression?
Each of the paragraphs of your essay must contain a topic sentence for better presentation. These topic sentences must be then moved to a fresh file to figure out their progression. This further helps present a better overview of the structure of your essay and will keep your paper more organized. You can make use of transition sentences in your essay to strengthen its structure and establish a clear connection between different paragraphs.
Analyzing each paragraph
Once you are done with learning the process of revision, the next step is to analyze each and every paragraph separately. The content of your paragraphs must be strong and supportive. You must ensure that each sentence of your paragraph-
- Supports the topic sentence.
- Remove it if it has been stated elsewhere.
- If it is not consistent, then work towards resolving the contradiction you made.
Polish your language
The final step is to focus and polish your content that too by working on each sentence. It is essential that the essay you write for your assignment conveys the idea clearly and fluently. You need to convert your unnecessary complex sentences into more simple ones so that you are able to enhance the clarity level that can make the readers understand what you want to convey to them.
- Avoid the use of complex sentences in your essay and go for more direct ones.
- Do not include long sentences; instead, split them into shorter ones.
- Too many short sentences can make the text appear a bit choppy and abrupt. So, make use of conjunctions and semicolons in your content.
- Include transition words as well to highlight the connection between different points.
- Use more simple words and phrases. Remove the unnecessary ones.
- Check all the grammatical mistakes and spelling errors.
So, these were the three most crucial steps that you need to follow for revising your essay appropriately. Apart from this, if you ever need help regarding your academic essays or assignments, feel free to contact our online essay writing services for professional help and guidance.