by Suzanne Davis | May 28, 2020 | Writing Process
How do you develop essay ideas? How do you find an interesting topic you can use for academic writing? Start with prewriting activities that help you unleash your thoughts and put them onto paper. What is prewriting? It is the first stage of the writing process...
by Suzanne Davis | May 14, 2020 | Reading and Research
Finding academic research online isn’t easy. When I switched from teaching at colleges to online academic tutoring, I missed going to university libraries and having access to scholarly journals and other vasts amounts of research (whether I was there in-person or...
by Suzanne Davis | Mar 26, 2020 | Writing Process
The academic writing process is like sketching a portrait. You need preparation and planning for what you will draw. You sketch, and then erase and change what you’ve drawn, and then show it to others. As you continue to work, you grow as a sketch artist. The...
by Suzanne Davis | Feb 6, 2020 | Reading and Research, Writing Technology
There are 20 million books and texts on the Internet Archive. Internet Archive is a digital library with free books, texts, videos, audio recordings, webpages, and software. It is my go-to place for research because you can find credible primary and secondary...
by Suzanne Davis | Jan 16, 2020 | Writing Technology
“Suzanne, I have the perfect online writing tool for you.” I receive many emails from people telling me about an excellent new app, tool, or website for writers or students. Some of these online tools and resources are free, some are inexpensive, and some are an...
by Suzanne Davis | Dec 12, 2019 | Writing Essays and Papers, Writing Prompts
“Description is what makes the reader a sensory participant in the story.” –Stephen King Stephen King wrote about description in stories. But the same advice is correct for descriptive essays. Get your readers engaged by making them sense and...
by Suzanne Davis | Oct 24, 2019 | Writing Essays and Papers
This post isn’t a guide on how to write an “A” research paper. I know that’s a huge goal for most college students. I remember anxiously waiting for 2, 3 days or even a week to find out if I achieved that “A” or “A+” on a research paper. There’s nothing wrong...
by Suzanne Davis | Oct 9, 2019 | College and Graduate School, Writing Essays and Papers, Writing Process
Everyone writes an academic essay that crashes. It doesn’t get the grade you hoped it would, there are comments and corrections along the margins or even just a low grade. It hurts, eats away at your confidence, and it’s especially hard when it happens at the...
by Suzanne Davis | Sep 12, 2019 | Writing Essays and Papers
To be a person is to have a story to tell. –Isak Dinesen What stories are within you? A personal narrative is a story from your life. So, it is simple to write. Maybe. If you come up with an experience you’re dying to share–it is easy to get...
by Suzanne Davis | Aug 29, 2019 | Writing Organization
Do you ever feel overwhelmed by writing? Your teacher or professor assigns a writing project, and you think “I don’t even know how to start?” Or do you struggle to begin any other piece of writing that seems large? Even experienced writers get nervous about writing...