Exploring Writing Conventions: What They Are and How to Use Them Effectively

Many students perceive writing conventions as a sort of screamer. However, they are must-know basics for everyone, and no one can be successful without mastering them. You cannot have a good job without writing correctly. You cannot even send a complaining letter to any of the organizations without knowing how to write them properly.

Therefore, you should learn writing conventions as early as possible, in school or college, because none of the spheres of our lives can exist without them. Even if you think that you will never face those conversations, or it is necessary only for a writer, you will see throughout your life how often you will need to apply them. Learn how to become one of those essay writers who master any grammar below.

What Conventions in Writings Are

Writing conventions are the basic rules of grammar, punctuation, and spelling. Only thanks to them can a writer understand the text when reading it or understand the speech of a politician when hearing it, for example.

Can you imagine if one of those was created without sticking to conventions? It would be a mess then because anyone would create content according to his own understanding. People wouldn’t simply understand each other and could not even read a book or an article.

This is what writing conventions are created for. Without them, a writer wouldn’t understand a single message or even a sentence in a text. You understand the meaning of any message only thanks to them. They activate it and show you how to read it. They indicate the intonation, and only thanks to proper punctuation and grammar, you really get the main idea and understand the emotional part of a book or magazine article.

Writing conventions are obligatory for anyone, especially students. Of course, if a writer has tons of assignments and always lacks time, they might miss this important part of their life and studies. This guide will help you get a better idea of writing them, though, so keep reading till the end.

Core Writing Conventions

Don’t be so scared when hearing about these non-understandable writing things. Once a writer understands what the main writing conventions are, they will find it much easier to learn and master them. Therefore, the core writing include:

• Spelling.
• Punctuation;
• Capitalization;
• Grammar.

We bet you have heard about all of them many times already and should have at least some understanding of what they are and where they come from. If not, though, see the explanation below.

Spelling conventions

Even if you don’t realize it, you have first started to get acquainted with writing and spelling conventions in early childhood. For example, your parents could teach you letters and words when you were a little child. You learned to recognize and point letters in your name or such important words as “mother,” “father,” “granny,” etc.

Everyone studies how to write these words in childhood, and you aren’t an exception for sure. This is how spelling work, and they are extremely important in life, especially for your career. You don’t even imagine how many CVs are rejected because of quite banal spelling mistakes.

It means that you should study spelling as early as possible. When you are young, it is much easier to learn everything new, and spelling isn’t an exception. When certain spelling patterns are already formed in your mind, it will be very difficult to get rid of them and make your brain remember new ones.

Punctuation conventions

You might think that missing a comma or a semicolon isn’t that crucial, but you are wrong. Punctuation is something that makes us understand the true meaning of the message or text. If you read a message without a single punctuation mark, would you understand it properly? Of course, not.

Everyone would insert his or her meaning in that message and understand it not like the author wanted but like your brain would interpret it. Some people wouldn’t understand the message at all because it would be deprived of sense and reminded of just a set of words and nothing more.

Punctuation rules give you an idea of where to make a pause, where is the excitement or disappointment, what intonation the author supposed us to read the message with, etc. You may say that when you speak, you don’t use it and everyone is happy with it. It’s not true, though. You use many ways to show punctuation when speaking. For example, you make pauses where necessary and use proper intonation, rhythm, expression, etc. If you spoke monotonously, no one would get your message either.

Therefore, punctuation is a way of expressing the message when writing it. Without it, any text and even sentence can be created. Understanding grammar is crucial because people won’t understand what you want to say in a written form.

Capitalization conventions

Yes, you might say that the capitalization rule isn’t as important as the rest of the conventions because everyone would understand the message no matter whether some words start with capital letters or not. However, thanks to capitalization, you can see where the next sentence begins. Although there is a colon, your sight will identify a new sentence much easier when there is a capital letter.

Moreover, many words can be emphasized by capitalization rules. Thanks to it, a writer can identify the names of countries, cities, or people. You might say that anyone would understand the name of a person or a city even if they are not capitalized.

One or another writer will be surprised to know that many names are not as common as the names of some cities. Many book characters are named after various plants, animals, or subjects. Therefore, you will never understand a character’s name if it is not capitalized.

Grammar conventions

This scary word isn’t that scary at all if a student understands what it really means. Grammar includes:

• The structure of sentences and paragraphs;
• Choice of words;
• Parts of speech;
• Clauses and phrases.

Words must also be arranged in a sentence properly, and this is what grammar was created for. There might be too many rules and exceptions, and it is easy to get lost in them all; that’s true. However, you don’t have to study the rules or grammar all by heart. If you ask your mother or grandpa, who writes everything without mistakes, whether they can recall grammar rules, you will hardly hear a positive answer.

The truth is most people learn and recall those rules and grammar when being children, and since they practice a lot — write, type, or speak something every single day — they never forget those conventions. It means our brain doesn’t forget what we have learned and just applies it automatically. You will also apply all conventions automatically once you learn them properly. If you have no idea how to understand the convention variations, though, check the following tips.

How to Learn Writing Conventions

Anyone should start studying writing conventions as early as possible. If you were a diligent kid, you could start familiriazing with them and acquire some basics when being in kindergarten. Then, in elementary school, you would just study them more, and until the end of your school, you would become really proficient.

What to do if you weren’t that diligent with writing, though, and didn’t think writing them would play such a crucial role in your life? You have some time to catch up and improve the situation with the basic grammar. Just follow the tips below.

Read a lot

This might sound like a paradox, but you really need to read a lot if you want to learn how to write properly with a grammar and rules. Modern children and students spend more time on different gadgets and devices instead of reading books. This is a mistake because, for that reason, you feel confused about writing them, and you then cannot do simple but creative writing prompts.

The truth is when you read, you learn them automatically without even realizing it. Your brain simply sees the example of how sentences should be built, how the words are spelled, and how punctuation is used to express a certain meaning. You don’t even have to learn the rules because your brain is recording everything, and you study everything subconsciously.

Therefore, if you want to know those crucial and significant writing rules, you should put your gadget aside for a while, take an interesting book (not an audiobook, though) and start reading. You can read anything — books, scientific articles, fiction, advertisements, magazines, and even comics. Whatever you read makes you practice the understanding of the rules a lot.

Some more tips and rules

When writing a college essay that would meet the requirements of your teacher, do the following:

• Avoid using fragments;
• Don’t use abbreviations;
• Create complete sentences only;
• Say no to run-on sentences;
• When mentioning someone for the first time, write his or her name;
• Understand how to cite properly.

Conclusion

Writing conventions aren’t as scary as they might seem. If you, for some reason, have missed them in school, you still have time to study their rules to become a professional essay writer. You cannot avoid learning them, though, because you will have to apply conventions in every sphere of your life, even if you aren’t going to become a professional writer.

Any professional in his or her field must know writing conventions and their basic rules. Even business owners write and sign different papers and documents daily. If you don’t have time to read and practice more but need to write a top-notch paper the soonest, you can always use the help of our professional writers, editors, and proofreaders.

We will deliver a top-quality paper to you within the toughest deadlines, and you will be fully satisfied with your grade. Stop struggling and pick professional assistance for your writing!