Importance of Proofreading a paper

Proofreading going through your paper, brainstorming, planning, drafting and revising. Sometimes, proofreading works well when you distance yourself from your work so that you can provide a fresh look on it. Taking some times off will help you to see the paper a new and possibly with a more constructive perspective. Similarly, you can also choose to print a hard copy of the text so as to review the paper in a different format where you can manually point out the errors that may assist to take the perspective of the reader as well as identify issues that you may ordinarily miss.

Reading the paper out loud will also force you to notice everything from spelling and word choice to the structure of the sentences. You can achieve the same by having someone read the paper for you as well. While proofreading, you will want to check the grammar, punctuation, the citations, quotations among other crucial items. This actually requires one to attentively go sentence by sentence level to see whether there is any mistake present.

Above all, you will also want to consider the feedback from other people due to the fact that sometimes it may be difficult to step outside of our work and view it critically. However, one can break from this isolation and absorption of writing through receiving insights and perspectives that you may have missed. Inherently, despite the fact that the spell-check and grammar-check tools provided by the computer are useful while writing, they do not substitute or constitute proofreading, rather you will need to initiate deliberate efforts to go through the paper and look for the mistakes.

Proofreading provides you with an opportunity to correct mistakes and ensure you do not lose marks you would have otherwise obtained. In addition, proofreading helps you to make sure that the paper flows well from the introduction to the conclusion. It can easily be understood by the reader and communicates the intended message. Proofreading actually helps to gain the perspective of the reader and therefore, it helps you to notice any difficulties that the reader may go through while reading your paper, and therefore, a chance to correct those mistakes before completing the paper and submitting it. It also enables you to verify that the paper adheres to the rules of writing ranging from referencing and formatting styles, grammatical rules, and that the paper meets particular institution or instructor requirements.