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Common Mistakes & Errors to Watch Out for When Proofreading Your College Essays

College essays are going to affect your final grade a lot, and every student writes up to 15 papers every semester. This means that you need to train yourself on how to do a good job, and how to submit essays that are going to get the best grades. Writing them is just the first part of the project, and then you have to proofread them to make sure that everything you’ve created is error-free.

However, getting them checked is easier said than done, and here we are going to talk about some of the most common mistakes and errors that you need to watch out for when proofreading your college essays. Keep on reading if you want to learn how to avoid these problems, and how to get rid of them with ease.

Don’t be the only one who looks at your work

The biggest mistake you can make is proofreading your own work and hoping that it will be perfect. We are not wired to find all the mistakes that we make, and since you are going to be the one writing the paper, you are going to miss some of the errors that you’ve made.

If you don’t want to end up submitting an essay that has more than just a few mistakes, then you should get someone else to read it before you send it to your professor. Your family member or friend will be able to notice errors that you cannot, including grammar issues, typos, and even sentence structure.

Utilize different tools

Source: grownandflown.com

Today’s technology allows us to do everything faster and easier. You don’t have to do it all on your own, and you don’t have to read every single word and look for the typo in it. Luckily, there are a lot of tools and platforms that will help you find the errors in your paper.

Starting from Word’s automatic spell-checker, up to different paid platforms, there are many things that will help you automatically proofread your essay. Some are free for use, others come with free trial versions or limited features, and there are also those platforms that you need to pay for to be able to use them. No matter which option you choose, you are going to hugely benefit from them, and you are going to save yourself a lot of time.

Consider collaborating with professionals

Sometimes we are too busy with our finals or more important projects, and when it comes to the papers, we just try to create something that will be half-decent and hope that we will get a passing grade on it. As you already know, the essay is going to play a huge role in your final grade, so if you don’t have enough time to focus on it, you should collaborate with a professional service.

As you can see on www.homeworkhelpglobal.com, a good service will help you create your paper no matter the subject, and the essay will be properly proofread, without any mistakes or errors. This will take the pressure off of you, and you will be able to focus on the more important things of your studies.

Pay attention to the sentence length

Source: edsource.org

Sometimes we are not able to put our whole thought into a simple, short sentence, and we end up writing something that is several lines long. The rule of thumb is that your sentences should not be longer than 30 words, and when you make the mistake of writing 100 words in one syntax, you are going to confuse the reader.

This does not mean that if your sentence is 35 words long you have to divide it, but when it comes to clarity, less is more. Try to write with shorter syntax and see how the whole paper is going to change for the better.

Just because you can understand your thought process, doesn’t mean everyone will

You need to know that just because a certain sentence makes sense to you, it does not mean that it will make sense to everyone who reads it. Because of this, you need to pay attention to the punctuation, and you need to add commas and full stops where needed. The comma is going to help the reader understand and divide the sentence, and the full stop will help them comprehend your point.

Take your time when doing this, and know that in this case, a third-party service will help you out a lot. If you don’t want to hire them, then you need another set of eyes to see if everything that you’ve written makes sense for everyone.

Spelling mistakes must be corrected

Source: mekreview.com

When we write something, no matter how good our knowledge of the language is, we are bound to make spelling mistakes. Sometimes that will happen because we are rushing to finish the writing, sometimes our thoughts are going to be faster than our typing abilities, and at other times, we just won’t have the needed focus to avoid these mistakes.

However, when you proofread your writing, you need to pay attention to every word that you have written, and you need to make sure that there are no typos and no spelling mistakes. Your professor may not notice all of them, but submitting a paper with typos is going to show your lack of interest in the subject.

Your grammar should be on point

Finally, when you are writing a college essay, your grammar has to be on point. No matter the subject that you are creating the writing for, you have to pay attention to this. You need to show your professor that you pay attention to these things and that you are on the level you are supposed to be. Everyone makes mistakes, and even though it is not the end of the world if you use the wrong tense, it is still going to portray you in the wrong right. So make sure that your grammar is on point and if needed use additional services and tools for this.

All of these mistakes can be avoided if you take your time proofreading your writings. If you don’t feel confident enough, or if you don’t want to waste any time on your essays, and if you want to focus on your finals, you can always use a third-party service to help you out.

Jaime Hay