Sometimes you just forget that you have an essay due. It’s much worse when you have just an hour or two to complete your essay. It’s not only crucial to write fast enough but also to make sure the quality of the work is also high. Seems to be impossible? Maybe. However, we can still help you out with a challenging task like this. Here are a few tips on how you can finish an essay in an hour.
Start As Early as You Can
It’s pretty obvious – once you realize the deadline is so close, you don’t want to waste any precious minutes. That’s why you should start right away. But don’t panic. Simply follow easy steps on how to start working on your essay without wasting time:
- Read the task carefully. Be sure you understand what you need to write about. The main mistake many students make at this point is that they don’t pay enough attention to all of the requirements. It’s easy to miss some key parts of the task when you are in a rush.
- Explore the material you find through research. Research is a crucial step in the process of writing an essay. Search for articles and research papers that you can find on the topic to understand the basic aspects that you want to cover up in your paper. You might also need to find some interesting facts, statistics, etc. Adding some details from credible sources will make your paper much more specific, which is great compared to using general phrases and data.
- Create an outline. Don’t omit this step even if you are in a hurry. An outline helps you structure your paper and all the key points that should be presented in the paper. When you work on your essay without an outline, it’s much more difficult to create a logical flow of your thoughts and twice harder to work with evidence and arguments. Your outline might be created in the form of questions that you answer in the process of your work, a bunch of ideas that you came up with during the brainstorm, or as a list of the key points and thesis statements.
So, by the end of the first half of an hour, you should already have some ideas in your head, supporting evidence that you want to use in your paper and an outline that you can work with.
Don’t Forget about the Structure and Thesis Statement
Now, you can start writing your essay. If you have completed all the previous steps, it should not take much time for you to complete the first draft of the one-page essay in a matter of 15-20 minutes. Just follow your outline and complete it by adding some evidence and details that you find suitable for the topic and for the statements that you use in your work. For example, you might want to support some of your ideas with stats or social questionnaire results that you have found – it’s a great touch and always adds some points to the final grade for your paper.
A thesis statement is the core of your work; it should be created alongside your outline and sum up the work itself into one neatly worded sentence. However, it’s not always possible to start with a thesis statement, especially when you don’t have an idea completely formed in your head. That’s why you might want to start writing your paragraphs and come back to the introduction part later to finish it and add a thesis statement that would fit your thoughts.
Avoid Distractions
While you are working, it’s crucial to avoid various distractions, such as phone calls, texting, or talking to the people around you, as it takes much of your productivity away and also leaves you with less time for the work itself. You might want to take a break during this hour, and usually, it’s a great practice that helps keep your productivity high. However, when you have such an intense and challenging task, we recommend avoiding breaks and concentrating on your paper to complete it faster.
Have Time for Proofreading
You should always remember that you should also leave some time for reviewing and editing parts of your work. That’s why the earlier you finish it, the more time you have to polish your essay and make sure the punctuation and grammar are on point.
You don’t have to do it all by yourself, as there are multiple online tools that will help you proofread your paper. Grammarly is the most commonly used plugin that can find errors in your text or edit style mistakes that you have missed. It’s also much faster and effective than trying to proofread your paper in a rush. However, you should also read your paper one more time after using such tools as they might not edit all the mistakes.
As you can see, it’s not that hard to write an essay in one hour, though we would recommend you to plan your time and complete assignments long before the deadline. If you too many things to take care of, you can delegate your academic assignments to our team as we are specialists at managing the toughest deadlines and the most challenging papers.