How to Write A+ Papers | Elements of Academic Style

Start every paragraph with a topic sentence to reveal the main idea and connect supporting sentences, outlining four placement options from beginning to end.

Learn to craft paragraphs where supporting details clearly reinforce the main idea by clarifying, proving with evidence, and developing through specifics, examples, and comparisons.

Master how to connect ideas with linking words to clarify relationships, develop ideas, provide examples, and summarize, using the three categories of clarifying, approving, and developing.

Explore expressing what is similar through parallel structure to strengthen harmony, unity, and coherence, with guidance on sentence construction, article and preposition use, and coordinating expressions.

Learn to keep related words together to enhance sentence harmony, avoid separating the subject and verb, and place adjective clauses and modifiers immediately after the noun to avoid ambiguity.

Discover how rule six promotes the active voice to create direct, concise, and vigorous sentences by contrasting transitive and intransitive verbs with clear agents and receivers.

Learn to express potent prose by making sentences positive, replacing negations with definite positive assertions, and applying concrete measures to shorten and clarify writing.

Develop the skill to write with concrete, precise language by choosing specific terms, quantifying outcomes, and using active voice to create vivid, easily visualized ideas.

Learn to turn clauses into noun phrases and prepositional phrases, using active voice and avoiding wordy expressions to produce concise, powerful academic writing that respects word count and clarity.