If you like to party the exam period can be tough. After all, you’ve probably not been attending that many classes and your notes aren’t going to be that thorough. What’s more, the lure of the party scene is still going to be there when the exam period rolls around.

So how will you ever pass? Fortunately, it’s not as hard as you may think. You’ve just got to realize that the human brain works better in some ways than others and take advantage of that. It doesn’t end there either, as there are apps and programs to help you cope.

So what am I talking about? Read on!

Stagger

No, not home from the bar. I’m sure I don’t need to give you any advice on how to do that! What I’m talking about instead is that you’ve got to stagger when you study. We’ve got this idea that the best way to study is to spend the last days before an exam buried in their books, reading, reviewing and trying to cram everything between their ears.

That isn’t the best way to study, however. You see, our brain needs breaks. A much better strategy is to stagger your work. Do a few hours of cramming, then go do something else. Then rinse and repeat. In this way, you’ll allow your brain to reset.

Of course, the best thing to do is to start early. Don’t do this in the last week but instead start two or three weeks in advance. Then, even if you only manage to study for an hour a day, you’ll be much more likely to retain that knowledge than if you tried to study 10 hours per day for the three days before an exam.

Block distractions

As you’ve got a very active social life and you don’t want to spend any more time behind the books than you have to, make sure that when you sit down there are no distractions. The best way to do that is to get an app like ColdTurkey. These will block websites for you, like your social media and Netflix, for a couple of hours.

That means that you won’t have the temptation to go do other things and can, therefore, get on with it.

And that is the best way to deal with temptation.

Take naps

Naps significantly help us lay down memories. So use that to your advantage! Before you go to bed, re-read some of the notes that you’ve studied. It doesn’t have to be long. 10 to 20 minutes will suffice. Then they’ll be fresh in your mind as you hit the sack (and they’ll probably even help you sleep better!).

Do this every night where you don’t have a party (or make it a routine to have siestas) and you’ll be in a much better situation with a lot more memorized than you otherwise would.

Get summaries

Don’t have the time to go through everything because that 3-day party ate into your study time? Then bite the bullet and get a summary of what you’re supposed to study. You see, often there’s only so much information that you really need to know, while the rest isn’t that important.

So, get the meat and leave the gristle by getting somebody else to summarize for you. Pay the class nerd, or alternatively use a writing service – you can find out which are the best by checking out the writingservices.review because it shows the real comments and reviews of writing companies, which are written the same college students as you.

Use the dead times

As a party animal, you’ll always have your phone with you. So why not turn it into a studying tool? With something like Evernote you can actually scan your documents and your note pages and always have them there in your pocket, wherever you go.

Then, when you show up early at a bar, pull out your phone and take a look at your notes even while you order you first bevy. Similarly, if you take the bus, or you’re waiting for a class, or you’re sitting on the john, pull the app and read over some notes.

The best part? You can actually make note, highlight and write new entries to help you remember and form new documents. In that way, you’ll actually make progress. So skip the status updates, don’t scan your friend’s Instagram, and don’t comment on your last meal. Instead, spend that time studying. Don’t panic! It’s only for a short time.

If you can explain it, you understand it

Another good strategy is to get together with some other people that are trying to do the same work and explain certain parts to each. If you divide up the work equally, then not only will you make certain that you all have to study less, but you can also make sure that you actually understand what you’ve studied.

For really there is no better way to make sure that you understand information than to explain it to another person. They’ll ask questions and that will force you to actively revise and revisit what you thought you knew. From there, you’re so much closer to having the information down.

Last words

Parties and studies do not need to be mutually exclusive. You can both excel in the social scene and in the classroom. To do so, all you need is a bit of creativity and to ditch that belief that the books are completely boring.

They’re not. Some of the stuff you’re going to learn will be immensely useful in the years to come. So don’t sell yourself short by trying to cram it all into your head two days before the exam date, as then you won’t actually remember any of it. And then what will you have paid that huge university bill for?

After all, you can get drunk anywhere.

‘What am I going to write about’ is the most important question that you’ve got to ask yourself before you start writing any paper. But it’s even more important when you’re deciding what you’re going to do for your midterm. After all, with a shorter paper a poor topic can still be fudged as there is generally enough pre-amble and post-amble to get you through.

When the paper gets longer, however, that’s no longer possible. You actually have a big body to fill and you better make sure that you fill it with something interesting.

So how do you decide what to fill it with? To that, we’re going to dedicate the rest of this article.

Give yourself some space

Sometimes the best place for an idea is your subconscious mind. So, make sure that you read the books well before you’re actually supposed to write the paper. Then, do a bit of brainstorming and let it lie.

Come back to it a week later. Look at your brainstormed ideas. Perhaps open the book at random or re-read a passage that you really liked. Then jot down a few more ideas.

Rinse and repeat that a couple of times and you’ll probably come up with some ideas that you would never have thought up on day one.

There are a lot of tools out there

That not enough? Then think about using the many tools that are out there. There are entire literary groups that you can ask for help. Note that if you do ask for help, you shouldn’t just ask ‘what should I write my term paper on’ as that will probably get you called out as being lazy. Instead, try something a little bit narrower in scope. For example, talk about a character that you love and why, then see if anybody has any ideas for how you can write your term paper about them.

Here are some places to look:

• Quora. It is quite amazing to me how great the answers are that you’ll get back from a site like Quora. They really have a lot of experts who will gladly go out of their way to give you some great advice. So ask them for help!
• Wikipedia. This site gets a really bad wrap in the academic community. That’s to your advantage, however, as it means a lot of your professors won’t read the site. So go on, plunder it for ideas! Just remember to find different sources.
• mastergrades.com: Of course, you can ask somebody else to look for you, provided you’re willing to pay. Mastergrades.com is a great place to head in that case.
• Google Scholar: Scholar is just full of research and literary papers that you can use for inspiration. Find a couple that deal with the books you want to look at and look at the ‘further directions’. Hey presto, themes galore.

Possible areas topic

Want to come up with your own ideas? Then here’s some places to look.

• Choose a minor character. The great thing about minor characters is that because we don’t have to follow them the entire book, they don’t have to be particularly likable. That means the writer can do a heck of lot of things with them that aren’t possible with the main character. And that means they are a fertile topic for midterm papers.
• How about the villain? People always ignore those. That’s because they don’t want to write about the bad guy. Why not? Just because you write about them doesn’t mean that you’re suddenly bad. And the bad guy’s motivations are often just as interesting as the main character’s. So explore their side of the story. Heck, you might even be able to turn them into a hero if you look at the world from their point of view.
• Look to recurring themes. Writers are people too. I know it’s hard to believe, sometimes, but it’s true. That means they’ve got their own hang-ups, issues and interests. For that reason, it can often be interesting to look at certain themes that stretch between books – as those will give us an insight on the mind behind the words.
• Explain how an event in their lives can be read back in their works. If you’ve got something serious that happens to you, then it will often stick around in your mind and in turn color your writing. So why not see if you can take how a certain experience might have transformed a person’s writing? The best thing you can do is explore a bit of the psychological effects of certain events and then connect that to trends in their writing. Hey, presto! Term paper! 

Last words

So that’s it! Some great advice to getting you a term paper topic in no time flat! Show a bit of initiative and you’ll have something so interesting, so exciting that you’ll actually want to write the paper.

Now that doesn’t sound so bad, does it? So go on, get out of here. You’ve got a term paper to write. 

You’ve come this far. All the coursework, all the essays and papers, sitting through boring lectures, and pulling “all-nighters” at examination time. Now, you just have this one last project – the dissertation – and you will have that degree in your hand.

Here’s the thing – a dissertation is going to take you a long time, usually 12-18 months. And along the way, you will make some mistakes and have to re-do some parts. There are some mistakes, however, that are so big, your dissertation will lie unfinished or will be rejected. And that is one horror story in which you don’t want to be the main character. Here are 7 of those big mistakes.

1. Procrastination

It’s so easy when you know you have a deadline date that is so far down the road. “I’ll just take a day off,” you say to yourself. Then that one day multiplies and pretty soon the weeks and months are creeping by, your advisor is asking to see your progress, and you are nowhere. Serious procrastinators miss deadlines, lose their motivation, and sometimes the piece never gets finished at all. One friend of mine knew his department’s rule – a dissertation had to be finished within seven years of the coursework completion, and he decided to take one year off before starting on it. By that time, he was working, got married and had a baby on the way. Still, he insisted he would get to it. The seven years passed, and it was all over for him.

Another product of procrastination is that students will come up to a deadline and then try to get an entire chapter written in just a few days. This never ends well. It is rejected by the advisor or committee and it has to be completely re-written. What a waste of time.

Successful dissertations are written by people who know they must commit to some work at least five days a week. Think of a dissertation as a slow jog rather than a sprint to the finish line. And a little bit each day saves stress, carelessness, and, in the end, the dissertation itself.

2. Not Taking Comments and Suggestions from Your Advisor or Committee Members

When you submit our proposal and as you complete each chapter, your advisor, and sometimes your committee members, will want to see it. They will request changes or suggest ways in which it could be improved. Take these seriously and follow through. If you do not, you may damage some egos and make someone angry. It can mean a final rejection, and then you are starting again.

3. Not Using the Tools that will make the Piece Outstanding

Be thankful you are living in the age you are. Years ago, there were no digital tools that could assist with research, writing, statistics, etc. Today, there are so many and so easy to find. Here are a few that you should be using.

• Grammarly or ProWritingAid: These tools will check your grammar, sentence structure, punctuation and more, and make suggestions for how to fix/improve what you have written. Why would anyone not take advantage of these, especially since a dissertation must be perfectly composed.
• Online Libraries: In the past, students had to go to the physical library on campus to conduct their research. And because the research works they were reviewing could not be checked out, they had to stay in that library day after day. You may have to pay a fee to access a library or two you need, but that cost is well worth it when you have the ability to research from anywhere.
• A Professional Writing Service: There are writing companies, like SupremeDissertations, that have Ph.D.’s in all academic disciplines who are available to consult with you, conduct research, write, edit, and perform statistical analyses.
• Statistical Analysis Software: No more struggling with the analysis of your data. Pick one of many software packages, select the analysis type/need, plug in your data, and let the software do the work.
• Reference and Citation Tools: You will be researching and using a huge variety of resources, and they must all be cited properly, no matter how obscure they may be. You can our over citation and bibliography guidelines and then hope you have made no typos, or you can use a digital reference and citation tool, many of which are free. Plug in the information and the tool will create the perfect citation in a format you designate.

4. Research Errors

These mistakes fall into two categories. Some students fail to do enough research, and the review of literature chapter falls short of advisor and/or committee expectations. You will be sent back to conduct more research, and this means a re-write of that chapter.

The second mistake is to leave out a major piece of research that your advisor or committee members are familiar with and that you should have included. Again, you will be sent back to review that resource and work it into your review of literature chapter.

5. Not Using Some Type of Graphic Organizer

You will have a huge amount of research notes, paperwork on your methodology, data from your own research, etc. All of this paper has to be organized in some fashion, so that you can write each chapter in a coherent way. You need some type of organizer for each chapter. Traditionally, this is usually an outline, but you may have a different template that works better. Choose whatever template works best for you, but do choose one. Each chapter must be completely organized on paper before it can be written. Otherwise, your writing will lack coherence and logical flow.

6. Making a Mistake in Topic Selection

Your advisor may have his/her “pet” topics. And in an effort to please, you may get talked into a topic about which you have no passion or abiding interest. When you do this, your final product will be less than stellar and may, in fact, get rejected. No one can do a major research work like a dissertation on a topic that they find dull or boring. Be careful with topic selection – it must be something you will enjoy researching.

7. Not Selecting a Skilled Editor

You will not be editing and proofreading your own dissertation – that will spell disaster. You are too emotionally involved to be objective. Find a skilled editor in your field to review your work, even if you have to pay them. You need fresh “eyes” on your work, if you are to submit a final product that is not just acceptable, but exceptional.

No one who has not been through the dissertation writing process can possibly understand what you will go through as you write yours. And, because this is the first time you have ever written a dissertation, you can expect to make mistakes. You can avoid the big ones, though, by heeding these seven points.

One of the biggest bottlenecks you face as a student is how much you can actually write. That can put a real crick in your plans, particularly if you’re trying to write essays on different subjects at the same time and have other things that you need to do besides.

Fortunately, there are ways to widen that bottleneck. Here we’re going to cover 10 of them so that you’ve got a wide range of choice as to what you’ll do to make yourself more productive.

1. Singletask

First and foremost, stop flittering back and forth between different tasks and focus on one task. Sure, it might feel like you’re being more productive, but all you’re being is more busy. What’s more, there is actual research that seems to suggest that the very act of multitasking makes you stupider – both in terms of the task you’re doing and overall.

So stop!

Okay, it’s hard. Often you suddenly need something online for when you’re writing your essay. Then you get distracted and before you know it you’re doing something else.

What works well for me is when I divide my writing into three phases. The first phase is where I look up the information that I need to write my essay about. I find it helpful to open a separate internet browser and keep all the relevant e-book pages there so that I don’t get distracted by other content.  The second step, when you’ve got all you think you need, is to start writing.

Of course, often it will become clear that you don’t have everything you need. In that case, simply highlight those sections. Then, in the third stage, go and find the extra bits of information that you need.

If you follow this strategy you’ll use your time far more effectively.

2. Split up your editing and your writing

If you write a lot I’m sure you’ve experienced that sensation called flow. It’s when the world drops away and you just focus entirely on the task at hand. It’s fleeting, it’s fragile, it’s (at least in my case) rare, but man, does it feel good?!

It’s also immensely productive. So take steps to protect it. One of the best ways to do so is by splitting up your editing and your writing. When you feel something isn’t working, use the procrastinator’s response. This is where when your inner critic says ‘this isn’t working’ you answer him or her with ‘yeah, but I’ll deal with that later’.

And then you just keep writing.

3. Let it cook

Even better, put a gap between when you write and when you edit. This temporal distance will also give you an intellectual difference and will mean you don’t spend a whole bunch of time editing text that’s perfectly good to begin with.

Generally, I’ll write up the first drafts of the essays I’m working on one day and then edit them the next. As I’ve got a lot of things that I need to write, this means I stay busy, while still giving myself space so that I can see the forest through the trees.

4. Use breaks as rewards

You know you shouldn’t work long, as that will undermine your productivity. At the same time, you don’t want to take too many breaks either (as that will undermine your productivity). One strategy that works well is to set breaks at specific moments. For example, give yourself a moment off when you finish a section or an essay, when you’ve edited a text well or when you’ve submitted something.

In this way, the reward will become far more enjoyable and what’s more, the chances that you’ll end up spending the whole break dwelling on what you’re supposed to be doing will be cut down drastically.

5. Block distracting content

Now sometimes obviously the best thing would be if you could block the internet entirely. Sure, it’s full of piles of useful information, but more often than not that’s not what you end up looking at. Of course, blocking the internet is hard. We’ve all got Wi-Fi and turning that off doesn’t work terribly well as a single button press will generally turn it back on again.

For that reason, consider installing a blocker. There’s quite a few out there, but you could do worse than using Cold Turkey. It will block specific websites (like Netflix and social media) during the hours you select so that you can actually get on with the task that you’re supposed to do.

It can even be used to lock your computer entirely so that you can take some time off and actually get to sleep.

Sure, you could use your iron will to prevent yourself from doing all of those things. The thing is, willpower wears down. And so, wouldn’t it be better spending it on other things?

6. Delegate

And sometimes it’s just a good idea to get help. You can use online tools that are computer generated or you can even use some of the best websites that offer editing services out there. Sure, it might put you back a few pennies, but if that means that you’ve got a high-quality piece of well-edited writing that you then don’t have to edit so that you can get on with more important things, what’s the problem? This is particularly true since prices on outsource editing have dropped significantly over the last couple of years.  

Here are some services I personally use to speed up writing and editing.

• hemingway app: This great piece of software points out unwieldy sentences, adjectives and other problems that you can remove from your writing. By pointing out problems you have to spend less time editing and your productivity increases. Even better, the online version is free.
• grammarly. This one focuses on spelling and grammar and in its more basic version is also free. You can install it in word, where it will point out problems. Another great tool to reduce how much time you need to edit.
• pomodoro technique. With this tool you’ll get in 30 minutes of focused work, which can be just what you need to jump-start a project you’re doing. The timer counts down, you try to stay focused and the words get produced. Good times!
• the most dangerous writing app. Finding that you can’t stop stopping? Then try out the most dangerous writing app.  Here if you don’t write for five seconds what you’ve written disappears. Yup, that’s right. Forever. The thing is, it doesn’t matter what you write. You can write gibberish and you’ll still reset the timer. And often there will be diamonds hidden in the rough.

7. Take time off

And I’m not just talking about a few hours. I’m talking about getting at least a day away from the keyboard and the essay writing. For me, this is essential, both in the short and in the long term. In the short term, it means that when I come back to my writing I’m far more productive. Quite often I actually manage catch up and exceed what I didn’t do on the day I was gone, as I’m refreshed and recharged.

In the long run, it matters that you don’t burn yourself out by not giving yourself time to relax and enjoy the finer things in life. And that’s important, because what’s the point of producing that much content if you’re no longer enjoying it and you’re no longer taking the time to enjoy life?

The writing should support your life, not the other way around.

So give yourself a break, literally, and both in the long term and the short term you’ll be sure to reap the benefits.  

1)  Choose Your Subject

A crucial moment before you begin your English research paper is when you select your subject. You want writing your paper to go as smoothly as possible and factoring in how many pages your paper needs to be, your resources, the allotted time frame, and the amount of information you’ll have access to are all key factors to the process. In addition, going with a subject that actually interests you will do a lot in terms of sparking your motivation as opposed to having to slog your way through a topic that puts your feet to sleep.

2)  Keep the Topic Focused

While the subject is the broad person, place or issue, the topic is what you actually have to examine and say about it. Thus, you’ll want to focus the topic by researching background information concerning the subject and from that narrow down to a handful of main ideas to write about. A good way to go about this is by determining your opinion about the subject, what are the major players involved, what is interesting and important about the subject, and what types of issues or problems are intertwined with the subject? By answering these questions, you’ll be able to come up with a compelling, focused topic.

3)  List the thesis or objective for your paper

Your term English papers need a clear direction, and before you begin researching you’ll have to present your viewpoint by creating a thesis statement that you will then express and back up with facts in your paper. The unforgivable mistake of not choosing a clear direction is one of the worst common essay mistakes, according to statistics. Simply put, the point of the paper is to demonstrate your thesis as valid, and your initial thesis statement will give you a controlling direction as to what research materials you use and keep you on a set path the notes you take.

4)  Create a Preliminary Bibliography

This will be a list of sources of information you might use for your English paper. As you go along, you’ll want to evaluate the relevance of your sources and consider whether or not the authors are current with their information and the quality of their presentation of the topic.

Once you choose the books and articles you’re going to use, take down the information on 3x5 cards as you would present it in your final bibliography, then, once you’re finished with your paper, you can easily refer to these cards and simply place the references in alphabetical order.

5)  Put Together An Outline

A working outline is the backbone of your paper and will provide you with a guide to keep your ideas structured, in order, and on track. Create the initial outline before you begin your notetaking, and then as you do your research,  you can supplement or alter it as you fit. 

To get started, simply create a list of topics that you want your paper to cover, and then after that, break down the items into major and minor topics. This will provide you with a great starting point from which to build the rest of your outline.

6)  Get Your Notes Down

Now that you’ve got your working outline together, it’s time to start taking notes. By getting your notes down on 3x5 cards or 4x6 cards – with only one note per card – you’ll have a set of note cards where each card connects to a topic laid out on your outline. The next step is to then title each card with the relevant topic so it will simple to access the card you’re looking for once you begin to put together the final outline for the paper.

7)  The Final Outline

Essentially a pumped-up version of your working outline, the final outline further divides the topics previously listed into subtopics. To do this, just create separate piles for your notecards based on subject and then break each pile down into the various subtopics. At that point, you can create your final outline based on the way you wish to organize the topics and subtopic as listed on the cards in your paper.

8)  The Rough Draft

All right, you’re now ready to write. Remember, though, this is just the rough draft so your main concern is getting the content down as laid out in your outline and fleshing it all out with your notes, so don’t spend much time on punctuation, sentence structure or spelling. It is important though to structure the rough draft as you will the final copy, so it should consist of three sections: the intro, the body, and your conclusion. 

9)  Fine Tune Your Rough Draft

Once you’ve put together the rough draft, go over it again and make sure the content and structure of the paper are how you want the final version to be. Some key things to make sure of include:

• Do you back up each of your ideas with evidence?
• Does each paragraph provide a topic that relates back to your thesis?
• Are the transitions between ideas clear and smooth?

10)  The Final Draft

Congratulations, you’re at the final step to writing your English research paper! Just make sure to include your bibliography and citations into your final draft and double check your professor’s requirements regarding the paper’s formatting style and whether or not it should include a title page which should have the paper’s title, the course name, your instructor’s name, and the paper’s due date.Be sure to include any required footnotes which can be sequenced numerically either at the bottom margin of the page or on their own individual page before your bibliography.