Essay proofreading
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Now that you have done the major work of editing, it’s time for the refinement process known as proofreading. Here is where you are looking at those details like spelling, punctuation, grammar and repetition. Whether you are a student or an online essay writer - this part is essential to ensure the quality of your paper. Even the most skilled and experienced are prone to occasional mistakes. So it never hurts to double-check your work.The tricky part here is catching all those little details. That’s because, by now, you most likely have read and re-read your essay to the point where you have become blind to these details. This section offers you a checklist and a way to step back and ensure that you catch any mistakes during the proofreading process. Whenever you can buy an essay, professionals that carry out your order are going through a similar checklist. Most of them use automated software for it. But it never hurts to practice your manual proofreading skills. This is critical because it could come down to just one comma or misspelled word that is the difference between a 2:1 essay and a 2:2 essay. And, we all know that you want that 2:1 rather than the 2:2.
Maybe you are not sure what to look for when you undertake proofreading. After all, whether English is your native language or not, English is a tricky language in terms of spelling and words that are so similar let alone the detailed grammar and punctuation rules. That’s why we put together this checklist on what you need to do as an effective proofreading process.The paper writing help online by PaperWritingService writers specializes in writing English-language articles. Help is provided in English, taking into account all the requirements of spelling and the structure of the article.
Effective proofreading process
- Complete/Incomplete sentences: While you can break this rule if you are doing creative writing, essays require complete sentences. Every sentence needs what is called a main clause or it will be marked as a sentence fragment. A sentence fragment often happens when you start a sentence with words like “because,” “if,” “when” and “which.” You can eliminate using these words at the start of a sentence, which can help you minimise the risk of sentence fragments. Or, you can add a main clause, which has a subject and a predicate. Often, by reading your sentences out loud, you will get caught on anything that is a sentence fragment.
- Spelling errors: Although it is great that your software has a spell checker, you should not rely on it to do your proofreading. That’s because you may have spelled a word correctly but it is the wrong one for what you meant for your sentence. For example, it doesn’t realise that “form” should have been “from” or it should have been “their” instead of “there” or “whether” instead of “weather.” A spell checker does not recognise every word, especially technical terms or names. If you are not sure which word is appropriate, such as “lose” or “loose,” look it up in a book or online or get help from your tutor or a company that specialises in proofreading.
- Abbreviations: Typically, abbreviations should not be used in essays, such as “i.e.,” “e.g.,” or “etc.” This is because they tend to be considered less formal. To replace them, consider using phrases like “that is,” “for example,” and “and so on.” You may abbreviate a name of an organisation or society as many tend to be very long, but you must spell it out the first time you use it and include the abbreviation in parentheses so that, going forward, you can use the abbreviation and the reader will know what you are referring to.
- Numbers: This is an area where students often get confused about the rules. First, be sure to check that all numbers, figures, and dates are correct and there are no typos, such as when you meant to say “1881” but ended up typing “1981” – clearly a big gap in history there! Then, you need to check for consistency in how numbers are presented – 12 or twelve; 3,000 or three thousand?
Write the number out when it starts a sentence.
Write the number out when it is made up of one or two words.
You can use numerals when it is made up of more than two words.
Typically, any time a number is over ten, you can use numerals instead of writing the number out.
Check with your university’s preference.
Just be consistent with whatever style you choose when it comes to numbers!
When you need to start proofreading for these areas, there are many proofreading techniques you can use to help you get through it – and when we say proofreading, we don’t mean just read through it once. It is about using a few of these techniques to make sure you caught every little thing.
How to get start proofread essay
- Print out your essay because proofreading from a computer screen is challenging. Your eyes get tired fast and you start to miss things.
- Find a quiet place. Proofreading your essay takes concentration.
- Go slow with your reading to ensure that you catch everything. This is not the place to use those speed reading techniques you have mastered.
- Take many breaks. This means getting up and moving around and maybe even doing something completely different to have your mind rest and reboot for more proofreading.
Proofreading techniques to use on your essay
Read aloud and listen to the words as this will help you identify where there may be sentence fragments or awkward phrasing. You can also ask someone else to read it to you as this helps you to focus more on what is being said and less at processing the words you see as you read out loud.
Read backwards, which may seem very awkward at first, but you will be surprised how many mistakes you will catch in terms of spelling and grammar this way, such as a missing full stop or the wrong word that spellchecker did not catch.
Change how what you are reading looks in terms of font colour or font size. This will have you your brain feeling like it is thinking about and checking out something completely new. These types of changes can often make grammar and spelling mistakes more obvious, too! Just put the essay back into the font and colour required by your university before you submit it.
Read it the next day. Like taking breaks, this gives your brain and eyes more time to rest. This refreshment can make things that you never saw before pop out at you as obvious.
Give it to someone else to proof. By this point, you may have lost count of just how many times you have looked at, changed, and read your essay. This is when you can have a fellow student, friend, or colleague serve as your second pair of ‘fresh’ eyes. While they do this, ask them to look beyond just spelling and grammar. They can check content for repetitive words and inconsistencies in numbers or referencing formatting; quality and logic of thought as someone outside the knowledge or expectation zone of this subject matter; and language in terms of style, objectivity, and formality.