College grades are hugely impacted by the quantity and quality of the assignments submitted. Also, perfect college assignments are the easiest way to get professor’s praises and their special attention. With such an important role played by assignments, this article brings you the best tips and methods to produce high quality assignments.
College assignments
Assignments in college are usually of various kinds. They could be graphic or circuit drawings, programs, designs but most of the time, they are essays or textual presentations. In case of non-textual assignments, there is not much scope for subjectivity. Get your facts right, proceed as instructed and the results will be the same for everyone. For such technical assignments, refer the suggested text-books and also, Internet has various resources:
This article focuses more on subjective assignments that involve essays, text-based, presentations and/or similar ones.
Preparation
Every battle has its own preparations. It is the general rule of thumb to prioritize your assignments based on:
Due-date
Higher priority to ones with nearest due-date
Importance
Put more effort for more important assignments
Nature
Some assignments take more time but less thinking. They can be done later when compared to assignments that require a lot of brain-work.
Hence, before starting an assignment, it is essential to know all the details before-hand. It includes date of submission, importance and impact of this assignment, method of evaluation, expected length and the nature of the assignment.
Get your facts right
Before you start filling page after page, facts that form the core of your assignment has to be authentic and verifiable. Gather the prescribed text and reference books; visit the websites that provides accurate information; use the class notes of yours and classmates. From these resources, make a rough account of the topic that states all details, facts and information. Do not include opinions, conclusions, etc here. This account of facts is your base for the assignment.
Take a planned approach
Another important aspect is the structure of your assignment. Jot down the areas to be covered and sort them in the most coherent manner you could think of. It can be chronological, analytical or based on complexity in case of related topics. For unrelated topics, you can either prefer alphabetical order or a custom order provided by the professor. For each topic, choose the sub-topics that falls under your domain. List these topics and sub-topics and thus, you have your structure.
Do a rough sketch
From your collection of facts, draw your conclusions, make your opinions, identify the arguments and use your imagination. For each topic and sub-topic, ensure you have adequate information to produce in the final draft. List them roughly in a scale of 1:10 when compared to the expected length. This rough draft provides you insight about which topics need trimming and which need more attention. Repeat these three steps until your 1:10 rough sketch is approximately meeting the expectations.
Introduce and conclude
For the work you have produced, add these two important sections: Introduction and Conclusion. These sections are the best way to communicate your thought-process to the reader. Make sure you inform them about the scope and purpose of the topic, and the approach you have taken.
- A good introduction is essential to grasp the reader’s attention and keep them occupied.
- The following content must be consistent with what is said in the introduction.
- At the end of the article, the conclusion section must re-collect all important ideas and thus ensure your work leaves a lasting impact on the reader.
Doing the actual work
Once your rough draft, introduction and conclusion are ready, it is time to focus on the actual work: getting your content on the sheets. It might be written or electronic, but presentation plays a major role. So, present your ideas and facts in the best possible manner without going too much. Make sure you follow these rules:
- Your best ideas should be the centre of attention
- Include more facts in tabular or bulleted form than paragraphs of text
- Personalisation such as “your, we, I thought” should be avoided in technical essays
- Don’t force your ideas as facts; similarly, don’t present facts as your ideas
- Too much glitter spoils the show; so, keep your presentation effects to a certain extent
- Ensure your assignment stands out, for its ideas and facts, not just for the presentation.
- At the end, provide the details about sources of the facts and references (i.e.) the bibliography.
Validate
Before submission, make sure of the following:
- Proper adherence to word count or any such limits
- Coverage of all the essential details and indexing in Title page
- No out-of-the-scope topic
- Reference to all sources of information
Getting help
In case you are struggling in any phase of the assignment, never hesitate to get help. For help, you can always approach:
- Your professor or mentor: he/she knows how a good assignment must be and hence their words will be pure wisdom
- Your peers who have already completed
- Online help: websites such as writemyessayonline.com offer professional help
The all-important final step
The final step is ensuring you get the credit for the work you have done. This involves proper submission before due-date. No one welcomes a late submission. Also, plagiarism is not taken lightly by some professors. So, ensure your work is without plagiarism. On the other hand, also make sure your work is not copied by others. This needs a certain degree of diplomacy and stealth and we prefer leaving this part to you. Good luck!
