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50+ Best Writing Apps to Help With Essays and Other Content

December 2, 2020

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Yeap, writing apps. Again.

I know what you’re thinking:

How many blog posts with creative writing apps do we need to find the best ones finally?

Well, this one would be a nice try. It gathers all the best writing apps in one place, divides them into categories, and reveals the top advantage of each for your better work with text content. Whether you write essays, blog posts, or marketing content, here you’ll find the right tools to fulfill your writing needs.

Let’s jump to categories!

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Resources, Writingessay writing, resources, writing apps, writing software, writing toolsLesley Vos One comment so far

The SAT Essay 2020-2021: What to Expect

July 19, 2019

Last updated: July 2020

How to write an SAT essay:

  1. Read the prompt to understand the task.
  2. Read the sample passage, underlining the examples and evidence.
  3. Come up with a thesis statement.
  4. Outline your SAT essay.
  5. Write a draft.
  6. Edit it: check arguments and evidence, make sure there’s a logic in the essay.
  7. Proofread your SAT essay: check grammar, spelling, sentence structure, etc.

Good news for those afraid of SAT essays:

This section is optional now. It means they won’t require you to write an SAT essay this year.

Bad news:
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Essays, Writingessay writing, sat, sat essayLesley Vos View all 3 comments
personal-essay

The Ultimate Guide to Personal Essay Writing

May 25, 2020
A personal essay is a short writing work where the author describes a significant event from his life experience and tells about a lesson he learned from it. In academia, a personal essay is known as a “college essay” or a “college admission essay.”

personal-essay

Personal essay is not about college admission only:

Twain, Hemingway, Fitzgerald, and other famous essayists wrote them often to share their experiences, thoughts, and reflections. Some employers ask candidates to write personal essays before inviting them to a job interview. And even when you share a story in your blog, you write a somewhat personal essay, telling your followers about your experience.

But more often than not, a search intent of most students googling the information about these essays is about how to write a personal statement for college. Right?

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Essays, Writingessay writing, personal essay, writingLesley Vos View all 2 comments
college-essay-format

College Essay Format

May 25, 2020

How to format a college essay:

  1. Choose a topiс.
  2. Write an essay outline.
  3. Come up with an intro: write a hook, describe a story, add a pivot.
  4. Tell readers about the lessons you’ve learned.
  5. Write a conclusion.
  6. Create a few drafts, and then stay with the best one.
  7. Proofread and edit your college essay.

As a rule, personal essays are not about strict formats or word count.

When you write a personal essay, you need to focus on a story and make sure it reveals your values and traits best. The format of college essays reminds a narrative, with all the elements of storytelling in it. And with a standard, five-paragraph essay structure in mind, you can turn your story into a powerful statement to stand out from the crowd of other college applicants.

Let’s see how to do that.

college-essay-format

College Essay Structure

The first and foremost question all students ask is, “How long should a college essay be?” And although there’s no strict word limit for personal essays, admissions officers suggest keeping it up to 650 words.

It doesn’t mean they’ll stop reading it if it’s longer. Such limits are since most students tend to wordiness when writing, therefore risking to turn a story into a dull and watery text. And, as far as you understand, such essays won’t hold the reader’s attention for as long as you want.

So, the optimal length for your college essay is 250-650 words.

And now, for a college essay structure.

As well as any other essay type, it needs an introduction, a body, and a conclusion. However, there’s no strict separation in paragraphs a la one paragraph—for an intro, three paragraphs—for a body, and one last paragraph—for a conclusion. Most personal essays that worked were from four long to ten short paragraphs.

So, feel free to write as many paragraphs as warranted by the context of your story.

Start a college essay with the introduction. It will need a hook to grab your readers’ attention, a short description of your story, and a pivot to the rest of your essay. (A pivot is that very “aha!” moment when you go from a general to bigger picture, explaining how the described experience influenced and shaped you.)

In storytelling, it’s about exposition (an inciting incident and a rising action).

narrative-arc

Source

Then, format a body of your college essay where you’ll share more essential details and insights you’ve got from the described experience—this part where you continue sharing the plot of your story, with its climax and falling action.

And finally, a resolution. It’s the conclusion of your story, with a moral or point of view you wanted to share.

College Application Essay Format

More specifications for the format of your college essay depend on your admissions office requirements. Read carefully and pay attention to the details such as word count, font, spacing, alignment, etc.

Unless stated otherwise, format your college essay as follows:

  • Write between 250-650 words.
  • Make an essay 1.5 or double-spaced.
  • Consider fonts that are easy to read: Times, Arial, Calibri, etc.
  • Make your font 12 pt.
  • Use standard one-inch margins.
  • Delineate your paragraphs with a single tab at the beginning.
  • Submit your college essay in .pdf file unless other file formats are required. Before submitting, make sure this format is accepted.
  • Unless stated otherwise, don’t include your name and the heading of your essay to the document.

Above are the general format rules for college essays submitted as attached documents. At the same time, most schools ask applicants to submit articles via online forms by copying and pasting them into a text box. That being the case, please pay attention to the following moments:

  • Make sure your college application essay wasn’t cut off!
  • Word count and paragraph spacing can get messed up there, so please check everything twice or even thrice before submitting it.
  • The online form won’t probably let you use bold, italic, etc. Also, the big chances are that they’ll standardize a font and its size. If not, please format it with Times or Arial of 12 pt.

And please, avoid formatting your college essay with ALL CAPS, cutesy, unnecessary symbols, emojis, and #hashtags! Make it look professional rather than casual. It’s not a story for your blog or social media account, after all.

College Essay Samples

For you to get a better idea of how to format a college application essay, here are a few samples of essays that worked. But please don’t use them as templates: They are good to get inspired by different topics and writing styles, but their patterns won’t reflect your original voice and unique experience.

The first college essay sample goes from Kaylee:

college-essay-sample

Read the whole essay here.

The second one is from Benjamin:

college-essay-sample

The full version is here.

And finally, let’s take a look at this one from Curtis:

college-essay-sample

The end of this story is here.

As far as you see, all three essays have different formats (word count, paragraph quantity and length, writing style, etc.), but they are fantastic because of their sincerity and reflection.

Ready to share your story with admissions officers? (And our essay writers are ready to help you choose the best format for your college essay, if needed!)

Essays, Writingessay format, essay writing, personal essay, writing tipsLesley Vos Leave a comment

How to Write a Perfect Essay Outline

August 14, 2019
An essay outline is a plan of your academic paper, where you structurize it and organize the main points into paragraphs so it would be easier for you to write an essay.

essay-outline

You can’t write an essay without outlining. Fine, you can do that if a low grade is okay for you to get. But those willing to craft a paper that’s worth A+ will need to create an essay outline and organize their research in one place before writing.
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Essays, Writingessay outline, essay writing, outlineLesley Vos View all 19 comments

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