What To Include In Your Assignment Writing Checklist?

Assignment writing is a process of many intricacies. It requires students to focus on many things to get a proper assignment done. That’s why they need to understand all the key things they should tend to in order to create a good-quality assignment.

That’s when having a checklist for assignment writing can help immensely. So, what exactly is an assignment writing checklist? It’s a worksheet that allows you to create good-quality assignments each time. So, here is an assignment writing checklist for you:

1: Understanding the Assignment Requirements

The first and perhaps the most important element in assignment writing is to understand the assignment requirements. Whenever you are assigned such assignments in college, school, or university, the assignee gives you a certain set of prompts or guidelines.

Therefore, the thing you should focus on initially are:

The number of words you are expected to turn in;
The formatting style expected by the instructor;
And the deadline—so you can schedule everything.

Lastly, you can also focus on any additional guidelines or rules provided by the instructor. This varies from teacher to teacher, but in most cases, it’s just a guideline that requires something specific in your assignment content.

2: Research and Gathering Information

The second phase of your assignment writing checklist is gathering all the material that you’re going to need in your assignment. Now this part of your assignment always requires you to conduct thorough research on the assigned topic.

Now, where should you gather your information from? Google is your best friend, but you should also look into the following:

Relevant books and literature;
Finding scholarly articles—online or otherwise;
Reputable websites like Google Scholar or JSTOR.

Then you will have to take notes and properly document your research. You don’t need to go extensive on the details; just make sure you create enough notes to use information when references and citations are needed.

3: Creating an Outline or Structure

The next step is to create an outline and structure. In most cases, instructors or teachers provide proper guidelines about the outline and structure. Now, you need to fit all the research data and information you gathered into this outline.

So, how do you create an assignment outline? You will have to organize your ideas properly. That’s why it usually goes like this:

Introduction;
The subject of the argument (including subheadings);
The argument itself (more subheadings and main body);
The solution to the problem (subheadings included);
And citations.

Then you will have to ensure that all of these parts are flowing and complimenting each other. Assignment writing has no place for fluff or redundant text. So, make sure all of these different parts of your assignments are in alignment with one another.

4: Introduction

The first actual writing you’d do in an assignment is the introduction. This part may not be the longest, but it needs to be the most captivating. This part of your assignment decides whether the reader is interested in perusing the rest of your text or not.

That’s why you need to craft an engaging and informative introduction first. That’s why you will start out with the following:

A first line that captivates the reader;
Proper but brief information on the background of your topic;
And a thesis statement alongside a research question to induce the argument.

This will ensure that your argument starts off on the right foot, and for that to happen, your introduction should be around 10-15% of your entire assignment text.

5: Main Body

This is the majority of your assignment and that’s why the main body needs most of your focus. This is also part of your assignment where you need to be most careful with quality, argument, structure, language, readability, etc.

That’s why the first thing you’re going to do in the main body is present the primary points of your assignment. As indicated in the outline section, this is where you would define, describe, or introduce the subject of your assignment/argument. After that, you will have to provide examples, proof, and evidence for your argument.

One important thing to remember while writing the assignment’s main body is to convey your points using simple and easy language. Avoid using complex or difficult words in your writing and make your points easy to understand for everyone.

When you are having difficulty writing assignments in accordance with the above requirements, consider paraphrasing. It simplifies the process of changing complex words with simple ones as well as writing points and arguments more easily.

However, as manually paraphrasing takes time and effort, consider using a paraphrasing tool

to present complex points or arguments in an easy way. The tool will paraphrase your text and provides a more clear and readable version of it in no time. Once you’re done with writing the main body of the assignment, always cite each argument as you go along.

Try to make sure everything goes in a linear manner, as it should in academic content. Therefore, focus on writing the main body and pour as much quality into it as possible.

5: Conclusion

Now the conclusion is part of your article that requires equal attention as any other area. In fact, some would argue that concluding your assignment article is one of the key essentials of assignment writing. That’s why you need to:

Properly summarize the contents of the article;
Restate or reignite the question, aka research query or thesis statement;
And make sure the conclusion is a thoughtful and detailed one.

The conclusion is also the shortest part of your assignment. That’s why you need to ensure that it’s summarized properly. You can summarize it manually or can try an online summarizing tool to summarize the entirety of your assignment within a few words in no time.

6: Editing and Proofreading

The next thing you will be doing is proofreading and editing. If you have been careful throughout, you may not require a lot of edits. However, you do need to be sure that you are submitting the best that your assignment article can be. That’s why you need to:

Analyze your text for grammar issues, and fix spellings, missing punctuations, etc.;
Break down sentences that might be too long—avoid extending past 12-15 words;
Evaluate the overall alignment of paragraphs, flow, structure, etc.;
And make sure that citations are given in the proper format.

This will allow you to avoid any minor errors like grammatical issues. It’ll also help you realize whether you have missed something or if some information needs better delivery. You can also tend to any content tone changes in this phase, i.e., changing from passive voice to active.

7: Final Review

The final review of your article will ensure that there are no things missing. This isn’t exactly the proofreading or editing part, as you can also show your friend or teacher the article before submission to get a second opinion.

So, here’s why you will do a final review of your article:

To provide proper citation and style required, i.e., APA, MLA, or Chicago;
To ensure proper formatting margin, font size, spacing, etc.;
And to check if any areas are missing something or can be improved upon.

The final review will also help you understand whether you have tended to the required word tally or not. If not, you can add more text or try to extend the existing one to meet the word count requirement.

7: Submission

The final stage of any assignment writing is submission. Now, this will depend on your institution, school, or teacher. You can email them, submit them to the academic portal, etc. However, you have to ensure that you submit the assignment before the given deadline.

And while you do it, give it one last look to ensure you have missed nothing. And always try to finish articles a day ahead of the deadline. So, on the day of submission, you can go through it one last time and see if anything is amiss.

End Notes

This is the checklist you need for article writing today. Make sure you go through each step mentioned in this article thoroughly. Then you will have to focus on specific or special guidelines provided by the instructor. This will allow you to write outstanding articles that’ll up your academic grade each time.