What Should Students Know About Academic Writing: Essential Dos and Don’ts?

Introduction

Top 3 Basic Language Rules to Improve Your Academic Writing

Academic writing is an essential skill for students, particularly when it comes to writing a dissertation, thesis or research paper. Knowing the basics of grammar, tone, and structure will help you express your ideas with clarity and professionalism.

If you wish to hone your academic writing, this guide will recap the top 3 requisite language rules to follow as a student to produce effective writing.

1. Use the Correct Tone and Structure in Academic Writing

Academic writing is formal, organised, and based on fact and does not conform to informal writing with respect to tone, wording, and format.

Characteristics of effective academic writing include:

• A formal tone that is free of slang or contractions.
• A clearly written and logically organised structure - introduction, body, conclusion.
• Supporting argument with evidence from reputable sources.
• Logically and cohesively written so that the content flows.

These guidelines will enhance the quality of your writing and better writing schedule, making it more convincing and authoritative.

2. Structure Your Sentences for Clarity and Readability

A clear and structured sentence is vital for successfully communicating your ideas. Frequently encountered problems with sentences in academic writing include:

• Run-on sentences.
• Misplaced modifiers.
• Sentence fragments.
• Dangling modifiers.

To enhance readability:

• Varying sentence lengths to create reader engagement.
• Keeping the sentence focused on one idea at a time.
• Reading work out loud helps discover confusion or awkwardness.

Example:

Incorrect:“Writing is fun it improves skills.”

Correct:“Writing is fun because it helps improve academic skills.”

3. Word Choice: Grammar, Punctuation, and Vocabulary

Word, punctuation, and grammar choices can greatly affect the clarity and professionalism of your academic writing.

Focus on:

• Punctuation: Utilising commas, colons, and semicolons properly clarifies meaning and assists in distinguishing meaning.
• Capitalisation: Capitalising proper nouns and being consistent in titling and headers.
• Verb Use: Using an active voice and exact verbs to support your arguments/promoting avoidance of vague generalisations.
• Avoid Generalisations: Using exact wording and supporting this with evidence.

If you are unsure of your use of grammar or vocabulary, you may want to use professional editing tools or seek out professional assignment help services that have experts in academic writing!

Frequently Asked Questions (FAQ's)

1. What are the Basic Rules of Academic Writing?

It is seen that the basic rules of academic writing are to maintain clarity and conciseness as these are the two most essential elements to be in writing. There is the use of the formal language in order to avoid colloquialisms. Follow all the specific guidelines of the formatting. The citation of all the sources should be done accurately. At the end, revise the written document.

2. What are the 5 Important Features of Language Used in Academic Writing?

Clarity, precision, objectivity, formality, and coherence are the five features of the language that are used in academic writing. It is said that the incorporation of all these features helps in strengthening the effectiveness of academic writing.

3. How Do You Improve Academic Writing?

In order to excel in academic writing, the student needs to focus on research and language. Make sure that you understand all the requirements of the assignment and develop an impressive thesis statement along with having the arguments with the help of the evidence collected from credible sources.

4. How Can I Improve My Academic Writing?

In terms of improving academic writing, make sure that you practice regularly, take feedback, and learn. Make the habit of reading texts in order to understand writing conventions. In short, it is said that Consistent effort is going to help in learning academic writing.

5. What are the 7 C's of Academic Writing?

In context, to 7 C's of academic writing are clarity, coherence, conciseness, correctness, completeness, consistency, and credibility. All these features are essential to academic writing as these are the principles that help in enhancing the quality and effectiveness of online academic writing.

Conclusion

This blog will help you with the basic rules of language. It will be beneficial for you, especially for assignments. Your remembering power improves with practice. If you can’t finish your assignment, you can take the help of an expert, senior and others. You can read more blogs on our portal to learn about the methods of writing and perfecting assignments.