What Constitutes a Good Academic Essay

This article discusses the qualities of good academic writing and essay. It highlights the steps to write an effective essay, including analysing the question, researching the topic, taking notes, and proofreading. The article also covers the qualities of good academic writing, such as development, focus, unity, correctness, coherence, and tone. References are provided for further reading.

What Constitutes a Good
Academic Essay
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An academic essay has been referred as the structured form of the writing on a
particular topic (Nenotek, Tlonaen and Manubulu, 2022). The major purpose of academic essay
is to present the new piece of information within using the existing facts and knowledge to
deliver the specific idea. There are major elements that needs to be keep in mind while writing
an academic essay as there are many attributes that constitutes a good academic essay. The
present essay is based on analysing the elements that develops an effective essay. Every
attribute will be analysed in detail (Groth, Kendra, Leo, Lilyana and Lukman, 2021).
“What Constitutes a ‘Good’ Academic Essay
A good academic essay should always have a thesis statement which can make it more
effective as compared to essay with no thesis statement. An academic essay should always
answer a question in an effective manner so that one can easily understand clear concept.
Having a clear academic essay will help students in learning things quickly. The writer of
academic essay should always consider some important points such as develop a thesis via a
set of closely related points by evidence. When writer discuss something effective in academic
writing it should be always sourced from the correct site. An academic essay should include
supporting evidence, detailed information, relevant examples from credible sources in the
context of academic content (Pablo and Lasaten, 2018).
There are some basic steps to writing an essay which must be taken into consideration.
Analysing the Question and Define Key Terms
Writer of academic essay should always read question, topic, and title clearly before defining
key terms. By reading it carefully they can understand the whole topic clearly and able to search
things related to it without any issues. After that, define key terms will be helpful for them so that
they can write briefly on that topic.
Establish a Possible Point of View
This is the second most important step in good academic writing and essay writing. One should
always focus on establishing effective thesis from which it can give clear idea what is supposed
to be explained further in an essay (Strong, 2022).
Research the Topic
For making an essay effective and good, researching skills is must for student or any writer. For
this, they must use journals, books, articles, blogs and other credible academic sources for
evidence and support so that one can easily understand what writer is about to explain further
(Ferretti and Lewis, 2018).
Take Notes
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It is very essential to take notes from your readings then only one can easily write an essay plan
in an effective manner. Taking notes will keep people awake and forces them to pay attention in
the class. With the help of this method, one can easily learn things as it helps in engaging
students. It helps in remember the information in details and helps students understand things
clearly.
Write a First Draft
It is very important to include introduction, main body, and conclusion to make an essay very
much effective. For every student, it is must and standard in academic writing and essay to
begin every text with an introduction about the topic. Here, the introduction sets the stage for the
author's claims in the main body. Here it is very essential to include things like content to be
included. In short, the introduction comprises a hook, information about the topic and a thesis
statement (Pack, 2019).
Proof Reading and Make Correction
For students or any academic essay writer needs to re-read the whole essay and make
changes if necessary, proofreading is very much important for students so that they can know
about what more improvement is needed essay (Warburton, 2020).
Get Some Feedback and Ask for Support
If necessary, students must take support from their friend, parent, colleague, tutor so that their
experiences can be shared with each other and if there are any changes need to be made will
be done easily from the support of peers.
Edit and Redraft
After taking feedback from peers, students must edit things and redraft it in a proper manner so
that final draft can be presented and hand it in (Greetham, 2018).
Complete or Finalize References and Citations
It is very much important for students to complete it after the completion of editing and must be
referenced properly to show that everything is true and not copied to avoid plagiarism.
After completion submit assignment for marking and review (Edgell, 2021).
Qualities of good academic writing and essay
Development - Students need to focus on development of essay, each paragraph should
support or expand the central idea of the essay. The idea of each paragraph should be very well
explained with the support of examples, descriptions and proper details. This will help in
creating value towards writing the appropriate form of essay (de Brusa and Harutyunyan, 2019).
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The main idea of development of the essay is to identify the key details and knowledge behind
how the essay is being written in appropriate manner. Development is the aspect which has
been identified and is created in a specific and signified manner for the perspective of essay.
Focus – This the second major point which is identified under the best qualities of how the
academic writing and essay is being done. Students need to focus on the key aspects as they
are important points which are mentioned in detail and appropriate form (Crossley, 2020). The
focus when maintained by the children will help in defining the key points which should be paid
attention to. The focus point should be framed in such manner that the essay constitutes the
single and clear idea of the topic. Each paragraph should have the single and main point, topic
and proper sentence formation which helps in understanding to pay attention to one key detail
which is being signified and is constituting the key aspects of the essay which has been
prepared by the students (Ismail and Sabil, 2019).
Unity – The unity is the continuation of the idea which has been designed and is framed for the
essay. Therefore, the unity should be represented in signified manner. Each and every
paragraph should be related to the main idea of the essay. Each paragraph should stick to the
main point so that the key details are observed within the essay on which the students are
focusing upon. The students should focus on maintaining the unity in the different paragraphs
about the essay which has been analysed in appropriate manner. This is the major reason
which is helping and is adding up to the qualities of the essay and towards good academic
writing (Ismail and Sabil, 2019).
Correctness – The students writing in the academic writing should focus upon the correctness
which is estimated and is defined by writing in standard English by framing the complete
sentences and this should be relatively error free (Strobl and et.al., 2019). This is the major
analysis which should be created in the manner of how effectively and in signified manner the
essay should be conducted in the correct manner. Therefore, there should be correctness which
should be taken into concern as important part of good academic writing style and in the essay.
This helps in understanding the points which are linked and are framed by the students as they
should focus on this point also (Beseiso, Alzubi and Rashaideh, 2021)
Coherence – The essay should be framed by the students in such manner that it is organized
logically, is ticking together, and is flowing smoothly. In the other words, every detail and
everything which is written makes sense to the students in appropriate manner. This will help in
declaring that the academic writing and writing an essay is made and is framed in signified
manner (Casal and Lee, 2019). Everything in the writing should make sense, this helps in
understanding the points and aspects related to how the academic writing and essay should be
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written. Therefore, there are aspects which are related to understanding the coherence point in
consideration.
In detail there is one such quality which is described and is identified for the academic writing
and writing an essay. This is mentioned as –
Tone – The tone of the writing academically should be professional and objective. The usage of
English language in the second person should be avoided (Knight, Shibani, Abel, Gibson and
Ryan, 2020). The refraining of the ignorant topics should be avoided. This will help in analysing
and evaluating the key aspects which have been determined and are depicted in a particular
tone at large scale. The academic writing by the students should be authoritative and in precise
manner which helps in depicting the pattern and tone of writing in specific manner.
The other important qualities are -
Arguments Developed by Evidence – The academic writing involves the use of empirical use
of authors claims (Djebar and BOURI, 2020). It is very important to analyse the concerns
regarding the important details which are to be mentioned within the essay and this should
develop the evidence regarding the essay and the arguments which have been undertaken in
the essay and academic writing in appropriate manner. There are concerns regarding the
evidence of the arguments which should be represented in the essay at large scale. There are
aspects which are related to analysing the points which are related to the key points in the
essay at large scale. Relevant facts must be drawn in the essay so that the evidence is
developed within the academic writing at large scale (Van Daal, Lesterhuis, Coertjens, Donche
and De Maeyer, 2019).
Therefore, it is said that that these key points are addressed in appropriate manner.
They are provided in respect to understanding the qualities of good academic writing and essay
which also helps in understanding that the essay writing should be performed in such manner
which helps the students to understand the concerns regarding appropriate analysis of the
academic writing and essay. These key points are the major basis which helps in framing the
good academic essay and this contemplates the perspective of knowing the positive aspects
and steps to improve the essay. It is very important to understand the key concerns related to
addressing and analysing the main points and highlighting the measures of writing the good
essay in significant manner. These are some of the key points which are being highlighted
within the essay writing structure to be noted in effective and efficient manner.
Thus, the essay included the key details of how the qualities are managed and
maintained within the essay. This has helped in understanding the points which have been
considered as a part of the qualities of good academic writing and essay and how it has been
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providing the details and qualities in significant manner. The steps within the essay were also
highlighted of how the essay can be framed in good manner so that it is able to provide the key
details regarding the structure of essay.
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REFERENCES
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Ismail, N.H.B. and Sabil, A.B.M., 2019. An Analysis of Writing Competency Principle and its
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Pack, A., 2019. Teaching academic essay structure: As easy as 1-2-3. TESL Reporter. 52.
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Strong, S.I., 2022. How to write law essays and exams. Oxford University Press.
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Van Daal, T., Lesterhuis, M., Coertjens, L., Donche, V. and De Maeyer, S., 2019. Validity of
comparative judgement to assess academic writing: Examining
implications of its holistic character and building on a shared
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Warburton, N., 2020. The basics of essay writing. Routledge.
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