Do’s and Don’ts of Dissertation Editing and Proofreading

After hours of hard work, you have finally finished writing your last piece of work, which will complete your qualification. You have put all your sweat in researching and analyzing the work presenting it in a clear and precise manner. Your dissertation is well-structured, and the content is up to the mark with arguments presented in an impressive way.

You are absolutely confident about your work, and you submit it to your professor. But what did you see! Despite your content being of high quality, your examiner is not happy at all due to so many spelling and grammar mistakes. All your work is ruined because of inconsistent formatting and layout.

This gives you a lesson that not only writing a good dissertation is important, but giving enough time to edit and proofread it is also important. Dissertation proofreading and editing must be done perfectly to score marks worthy of your efforts. Let us today discuss the do’s and don’ts of editing and proofreading your dissertation.

DO’S

1. Go through the whole paper – There is a wrong notion among students that are going through the paper roughly keeping a sharp eye is enough to edit and proofread your paper. You must read each and every word carefully, no matter how boring or tiring it may seem. There is no short cut to success.

2. Adopt a step by step approach – Read your paper more than once with different perspectives. First of all, look for minor mistakes like grammar and punctuation. Your dissertation should make complete sense with correct grammar.

3. Take a short break – You should not jump to proofreading and editing your work just after finishing the first draft. This would lead to anticipating the content, and your brain will read what it has already saved. Give yourself some time to forget what you have done and refresh your mind.

4. Take a print out – After you have made minor corrections, get a hard copy of your dissertation. Now focus on your writing style, sentence structure, flow and tone of your writing. It is easier to concentrate and read on a printed paper than on soft copy.

5. Get help – You must definitely be exhausted after this mammoth task. You can ask your friends to edit and proofread your work. It will give your mistakes a different perspective, and you will also get a chance to relax. You can also take help from experts in the field.

DON’TS

1. Do not edit while writing – Concentrate on putting your ideas well on paper when you are writing the first draft of your dissertation. Editing while writing will spoil the whole broth, and you may mess up things. Your priority at that time should be to finish your paper in the best possible manner. Leave the rest for later.

2. Do not try to finish it in one go – It is not possible to edit and proofread your dissertation in a single stretch. Divide it into sections or chapters and take each of it one at a time. If you will hurry or exhaust yourself, the quality of your revision will suffer.

We know that it is not easy to write and review such a huge paper. But with the above tips, you will certainly reach your goal successfully.

Summary: You will find a very useful do and don’t guide in this article which explains you in very simple words about what you should do and what you should not do to successfully edit and proofread your dissertation.

About the author: Chris has been working with Assignment Desk for the past three years. He has years of experience in this field and in helping many students in writing their thesis and assignments. In his free time, he loves reading books and spending time with his friends.