How to Write a Coursework
Coursework is a part of many school assignments that lead to grades and, ultimately, determine the completion of the course. Coursework includes essays, research assignments, writing articles, stories, dissertations, performing case studies or creating thesis papers. Unlike exams, coursework allows you days, weeks or even month for preparation. We’ll look at some ideas about how to stay organized when faced with coursework.
- Clean your work space. Start fresh. Take off everything you have there, clean it with a wet wipe or cloth, dry, and start laying out items. Some books, printouts, a lamp and your laptop is more than enough.
- Minimize distractions. Hide your phone and music player; close all unnecessary tabs in your browser, like YouTube and other players, news, etc.
- If you can, get a compact, white board, it’s going to be better than anything for noting your ideas. You can also write your to-do list, with deadlines, on a whiteboard and clean them off as you finish each task.
- Set an alarm for rest time. In time you’ll stop getting negative reactions to the sound of your alarm clock.
- Work each day at the same time. This will help train your internal clock and create a stable routine. Routine is very effective in doing homework well and on time.
- Time your tasks to find out how much time you need for each one. This will help you schedule other assignments, and help with scheduling longer research thesis papers.
- Your body can get accustomed to any routine. So get into the habit of sleeping 7-8 hours each night. If you want to graduate alive, don’t pass up on a healthy dose of rest.
Try these tips and see if your results improve.
Writing a Coursework Paper
Any type of coursework you get assigned will be either a paper with the distinct structure: introduction-body-conclusion, or a paper with undefined format (e.g., answer questions). If you are asked to discuss a topic, you first need to decide which topic you’d like to cover.
There’s a reason why everybody recommends that you avoid shelving any of your assignments. Look into your assignments as soon as you get them, see what you can do right away, and what you can put on your schedule. Tackle your homework: offense is a better tactic than defense.
Divide your work into parts, so it’s easier to find time for rest.
For example, if you need to critique an article:
- Read the article you need to critique (you can even do this on your way home).
- Go make some tea, rest your eyes.
- Take a highlighter, notepad, pen. Start reading the article a second time, taking notes and highlighting the most important parts (just don’t overdo with highlighting).
- Take a 10-minute break for exercise. Basic physical exercise helps your brain reboot.
- Go through your notes and outline the paper.
- Draft the paper right away, while the notes are fresh in your mind.
- Take half an hour break, drink some more tea.
- Go back to your article critique, look through instructions once more, edit and format your paper as required. Make corrections if needed.
- Take another short break, rest your eyes, and go on to the next assignment.
How to Improve the Content of Your Paper
- Always check for mistakes. Word or other text processors won’t see a mistake or misspelled words if the problem is with semantics.
- Avoid plagiarism. Don’t be lazy with proper references and try to understand what you’re quoting. A great coursework paper is one where you explain the subject in your own words, and show how you understand it. Use quotes only to support your own argument.
- Use your active vocabulary. Sometimes students use synonyms that people hardly ever use, but instead of making their writing more colorful, it simply sounds awkward. Also use words and phrases that sound natural to the intended audience.
If no guidelines or tips work for you, hire a professional to write an example paper. Buy a sample from a good source to be sure you’re learning from a high-quality example. A plagiarized low-cost paper won’t do you any good.
