How to Proofread Your Essay

Knowing how to proofread an essay is an essential skill if you are writing for an audience of any kind.

11:39 18 March 2021

Whether you are writing for publication, for a homework assignment, or simply to share with friends or family, you need to proofread your writing.

 

Remember that every piece of writing that you put before someone’s eyes either builds your reputation as a writer or diminishes it. It doesn’t matter whether you ask someone to write my essay or not because you should always put your best foot forward. Essay proofreading is one of the chief ways that you can learn to write with excellence. 

 

What to Look For When Proofreading

 

Many people have the mistaken notion that proofreading is only about looking for spelling errors. Spelling is one component of essay proofreading, but there are other equally important things to consider. While proofreading in its truest sense primarily involves looking for mechanical errors, if you want to make your work the best it can be you will also consider things that need to be edited.

 

Content

 

Perfect spelling isn’t going to help you if your writing lacks great content. Content is the message being delivered to the reader. It needs to stick to the topic, be interesting to read and satisfy whatever your reader was looking for when he or she decided to read your writing.

 

Grammar

 

You might have the best content in the world, but poor grammar will greatly affect both your reputation and the reader’s ability to understand what you’re trying to convey. You will lose a significant number of readers if you don’t make grammar a high priority. Even readers who don’t know grammar themselves will detect if you’re consistently using bad grammar.

 

Spelling

 

If you don’t know how to spell then make hearty use of a program that checks your spelling, a dictionary, or find someone who knows how to spell and can proofread your work. Just remember that if you are using a computer program to check your spelling, it will not correct if the word is spelled correctly but used inappropriately. 

 

Complete Sentences

 

I edit for everyone from grade school kids to bestselling authors and the most common problem I encounter among writers is the inability to write a complete sentence. Check to make sure that every sentence is a single complete thought, has a subject and verb, is capitalized at the beginning, and punctuated at the end.

 

Flow

 

Writing needs to be easy to read. If it sounds clunky, choppy, or labored, the reader will quickly tire of it. The best writing is smooth writing where one thought connects easily to another.

 

Style

 

Nobody likes reading a textbook so unless you’re writing one or something similar to it, add a little personality to your writing. When proofreading an essay, ask yourself, “Is this boring?”

 

Proofreading takes time and it will likely result in revisions, which also take time and effort, but the end product is worth it. Make it your goal to produce excellent writing. 

 

Further down the page, you will find six essay proofreading tips that will help move your work from good to excellent. 

 

Tip #1 Let Your Writing Sit for a Few Days

 

One of the best ways to proofread your writing is to simply write something and leave it alone for a few days. Don’t read it or even look at it. Just put it away.

 

What does this do? It breaks the strong emotional ties you have to your writing. Whenever a writer produces a piece, it’s kind of like birthing a child. Whether you realize it or not, you develop a bond with your words even if you ask services to write an essay for me. Until this bond is broken, it’s hard to think clearly about your work or be willing to improve it. Setting it aside for a few days distances you from it enough that you should be able to view it a lot more objectively when you read it again. 

 

Tip #2 Read it Aloud

 

I tell all of my writing students that once they’ve left their work sit for a few days untouched, they should pick it up and read it aloud. They always ask, “Why can’t I just read it silently?”

 

If you read your work aloud word for word exactly as it is written, you hear things that don’t sound right or flow well. Missing information will beckon you, questions will arise in your mind, and mistakes will glare at you. Whereas, if you try to proofread something immediately after you write it or if you read it silently, it’s much easier to gloss over issues without even noticing them. 

 

Tip #3 Write a Single Sentence Summary

 

You can do this step before or after you write, but write one sentence that fully explains the message you are attempting to convey with this piece of writing. Check every paragraph and sentence in your paper against your single sentence summary to make sure it adheres to your topic. Omit rabbit trails or anything that doesn’t add value to your message. 

 

Tip #4 Check Mechanics

 

As a mechanic searches the engine of a car for faulty parts, check your work for mechanical problems such as spelling, grammar, and punctuation. Circle and omit any unnecessary words that take up space, but don’t add meaning. 

 

Examples: 

 

Jane is just wonderful!

 

Revised: Jane is wonderful!

 

My dog is very excited that you’ve come to visit. 

 

Revised: My dog is ecstatic that you’ve come to visit. 

 

Fix whatever is broken. 

 

Tip #5 Hire an Editor

 

If you are writing something lengthy or important it might be worth your while to hire an editor. Even though I edit for other people when I’m writing something really important I hire someone else to edit for me. Another trained eye will often see what you and I miss when we evaluate our work. 

 

**If you happen to be one of my writing students reading this, DO NOT hire an editor!

 

Tip #6 Do Your Best Work

 

When you finish essay proofreading ask yourself, “Is this my best work?” In most cases, it doesn’t have to be perfect, but it should be excellent, not just adequate. Do your best and rest. 

 

Extra Proofreading Tips for Writing Online

 

Writing online is different from writing in other venues. The writing is as much for the eye as for the mind. The visual effect is as important as the words themselves.

 

Be brief. Long pages of text are death to an online writer. A reader feels stress when he or she sees an enormous amount of uninterrupted text. It might be fine in a tangible book, but it won’t fly with online readers.

 

Get to the point. Write tight. Say what you need to say and move on.

 

If you need to say a lot then break it up into bite-sized pieces by using subtitles, sections, images, or anything that will make it look less like millions of words strung together.

 

Use paragraphs. Short paragraphs are a must. They offer natural breaks in the text. One-line paragraphs are also acceptable.

 

Allow plenty of white space. It’s far more pleasing to the eye to see lots of white space on a computer screen. This is why it’s so important to break up the text.

 

Check for visual appeal every time you write online. 

 

About the author: Erica R. Gibson is a technological writer at writemyessaycheap. She is highly interested in keeping up with advancing technologies. In this case, she spends her spare time reading various blogs to obtain new knowledge and improve her professional skills.