Students should develop their writing and research skills in order to increase the level of their academic performance. The development of the specific skills of a reader, critical thinker, and writer is necessary for students who want not only to study and discuss the courses’ material effectively but also to express their own opinion, argue the controversial issues, and support their viewpoint. The quality of the students’ writing depends on the constant improvement of the research and writing skills.
The process of examining the necessary material and writing efficient papers can be discussed as challenging because there are a lot of specific standards and requirements for developing academic papers. However, when all the particular features of academic writing are learned, a student receives the opportunity to write papers with an effective thesis, convincing argumentation, and credible evidence.
During the course, I concentrated on developing and improving my writing skills. There were a lot of challenges for me as a critical thinker, but they were overcome with references to the knowledge acquired. Today, I can state that working with the specialized literature and writing academic papers, I developed not only research and writing skills but also critical thinking and the ability to evaluate the material in relation to its credibility and main idea.
It was important to improve my skills in an effective literature search, basing on the proper study and analysis of the information presented. It was rather easy to determine the author’s main idea or argument while reading the articles, but I experienced some difficulties with choosing quotes that could be used to support my vision of the problem. Moreover, I think that the process of determining the effective sources and facts necessary for the research to support the thesis statement is more problematic than the process of writing the main body of the paper.
Nevertheless, my competence in academic writing increases and the experience in writing different kinds of academic papers is helpful for planning the working process effectively, for researching the required literature and making the necessary notes, and for presenting the convincing or arguable thesis statement depending on the type of the paper. The course provided me with a lot of information about the principles of organizing the ideas logically and presenting the opinion on the definite topic clearly. My skills in working with databases, catalogs, and the Internet resources improved, and now I am interested in the effective work with the articles’ abstracts and keywords as the ways to intensify and improve the research process.
Academic writing is a kind of challenge for students. It is rather difficult for me to determine one paper, which can be discussed as the best work in relation to my academic experience, but I can concentrate on the significance of the work at the controversial and problematic topics, which helped me improve my abilities in academic writing. In spite of the fact I have developed my research skills significantly, I am interested in writing the opinion, argument, or persuasion papers, but not in developing the reports where the accents are made on the presentation of the factual material.
My best papers are those ones where it is important to concentrate on the definite idea and discuss it according to the specific theory or point of view. That is why the controversial topics where some perspectives can be taken into consideration are interesting for me. Topics on the art issues are problematic because they can be discussed differently, according to the researchers’ various opinions. Thus, I determine the purpose of my paper in the first paragraph to provide the audience with the necessary focus.
The best paper can be discussed as the best one only when all the expectations are met, and the goals are completed. To achieve these results while discussing the controversial topic, it is necessary to formulate an effective thesis statement, to present reliable evidences to support the ideas provided in the thesis statement, and discuss them thoroughly. The structure of my best works follows the rules for organizing academic papers. I know that it is possible to improve the organization of the paper when all the main points are presented in the thesis statement, and then they are logically presented in the body paragraphs within the topic sentences and discussed based on the effective evidence.
For instance, I state some viewpoints in the thesis and propose three or more reasons for it, and they are discussed in the body paragraphs in detail. It is my strategy to present the argument effectively. Moreover, the effective use of sources is meaningless when the quotes are presented without the necessary context. I pay much attention to this detail, along with careful proofreading the text after completing it.
It is necessary to determine the skills which can be successfully implemented in writing without references to the topic or course. Now, I can work with the primary and secondary resources, argue the problematic point, formulate an efficient thesis statement to reflect my argument, use the definite syntax constructions to accentuate the idea, organize and format my papers according to the definite requirements in order to avoid plagiarism. The developed writing skills are necessary to perform successfully at school, college, or university because it is important to know how to work with the material and express personal opinions effectively.