If you are reading this post, you probably are in a hurry, so let’s get straight to the point. There are two types of situations you can find yourself in, when it’s crucial to know how to write a fast essay:
- You are about to sit for an important examination like SAT and you want to learn how you can write an essay fast in an exam setting.
- You have only a few hours before a deadline for your 1000-word paper submission, so you need to master the art of writing a long essay fast.
Although writing a 500-words essay as a part of your exam paper and a 5-page essay that is due to influence your grade for the course are two different undertakings, they share one important key feature – the time pressure. This makes writing very difficult because when we feel rushed, we stress out and can get so frantic that we are no longer able to do anything right.
Therefore, before you proceed, take a deep breath and follow the advice written in a large friendly print on the cover of The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy: “DON’T PANIC!” When you panic, you make mistakes that you wouldn’t have done otherwise, and correcting those mistakes costs you more time. So keep your cool and skip to a relevant section of this post.
Alternatively, keep it simple and let us take care of this trouble. To write a really good essay in a short time, you have to be skilled and erudite. It takes a lot of experience to build this competence. Our writers have written dozens (some even hundreds) of academic papers so they can provide the best paper writings even on the tightest deadline. Order now and cheat the time yet again!
Quick Tips on How To Write A Good Essay Fast
Let us first deal with the situation where you have to write an essay really fast, as it seems more urgent. Here are the steps you must follow:
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Read the prompt carefully
Now re-read it slowly. Instead of rushing to write as quickly as possible to beat the clock after the first glance, make sure you really understand what the prompt is asking you to do. If you don’t do it right the first time, you probably won’t have the time to fix it later.
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Come up with a thesis statement
Decide on a point of view you are going to challenge or defend, on a key argument you are going to make and write it down in one or two sentences. This is the basis for your essay.
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Outline your essay
Even though you might dread every minute ticking away, you don’t want to save time by skipping this step. Nothing to save you the trouble in the future like a bit of planning.
You will need this roadmap to break your work into stages and measure your progress. In addition, the outline will keep you from rambling and chasing after too many ideas at once.
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Your best call now is sticking with the classic 5-paragraph essay structure:
- Introduction
- Body Paragraph #1
- Body Paragraph #2
- Body Paragraph #3
- Conclusion
- Put your thesis statement and some background information about your topic into your temporary introduction (you will revise and complete it later).
- Depending on the required word count and the type of essay, the number of body paragraphs can be altered, but 5-paragraph structure works fine even for a 3-page essay.
- Make sure that you only explore one key idea per paragraph. For your outline, come up with short topic sentences that you will elaborate on later.
- Summarize your thoughts in the conclusion.
Be generous with the time you give to outlining: up to 30% of all time available for this particular task can be spent on this step.
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Your best call now is sticking with the classic 5-paragraph essay structure:
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Flesh out each rubric from your outline
Now focus on each part of your outline one by one:
- Come up with a good hook for your introduction: a personal anecdote, a thought-provoking quote, a rhetoric question, a surprising fact.
- Elaborate on the topic sentences for each of your body paragraphs – explain your ideas, provides evidence, and support it with examples.
- Write your last thoughts and comments on the topic in the conclusion. Don’t put any new information here – it should only summarize the main points from your body paragraphs. Also, avoid simply restating your thesis. Try to tie your arguments in with the thesis statement and highlight how you have proven your point.
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Revise your essay
Now reread the whole text and edit it. Tweak the wording, correct awkward sentences, and other stylistic issues. Next, come down on your spelling. To spot your mistakes quickly and focus on words rather than thoughts, try reading your essay backwards.
Long-Term Recommendations for Speeding-Up Your Writing
This isn’t the last time when you will have to write fast. Here is how you can prepare yourself for future writing sprints:
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Master your tools
Some obstacles on the way to speedy writing are purely technical in nature. Try to identify where is the bottleneck between ideas being in your head and them being on the page and take care of it.
- If you type slowly, invest your time in learning to touch-type or perfecting this skill.
- If your hands get tired quickly, try another keyboard.
- If your word processor is lagging and you cannot upgrade just yet, try cloud services like Google Docs.
- If you have dyslexia, combine speech-to-text software with editing apps for optimal results.
- If you need faster handwriting for exams, try lighter pens – they are easier to control. Also, don’t put the cap or add any bulky decorations on top of your pen when you are using it.
- Exercising speed – ask a friend to dictate you a fragment from the book and try to take as detailed a note of it as possible.
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Read more
As we’ve said earlier, writing fast requires a certain level of erudition. Although you can research any topic, writing fast comes easier when you are familiar with the subject and have a couple of relevant arguments up your sleeve. This is why reading is such a useful habit – you soak knowledge that might come in handy later.
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Practice writing
Practice is the only way to excellence. To run fast, athletes train regularly. To write fast, you should exercise as well. Many writers agree, that 750 words a day are enough to build a habit, so start a blog or keep a personal journal to meet this daily goal.
While you are yet on the way to being a lightning-fast writer, let Paper Help take care of the immediate challenges. You can always depend on us delivering your papers right on time!