What College Students Need to Know About Paraphrasing

Paraphrasing is student's best friend as it allows students to convey academic content accurately without worrying about plagiarism. Students can do paraphrasing either manually or through the paraphrasing tool depending on their preference and ease. If college students want to get the maximum of paraphrasing they need to have complete information about paraphrasing. Manual paraphrasing comes with a lot of additional things, like methods and steps toward correct rephrasing of academic content and the myths and facts about paraphrasing. This article is going to be a complete guidebook for students about paraphrasing as we have rounded down the best and the most effective tips for paraphrasing along with the common myths. In this article, we will also look at the comparison between manual paraphrasing and tool-based paraphrasing. So, if you are new to paraphrasing read all the below-discussed sections and save yourself from the common mistakes that students make while paraphrasing.

Paraphrasing – A Guidebook

Tips for Effective Paraphrasing

• Thorough Research

Research is key to effective paraphrasing. As a student, we are asked to write the bulk of assignments and due to the shortage of time, we prefer paraphrasing instead of writing creatively with our own thoughts. To create assignments with paraphrased content our first step is always to research the material, right? A professional tip is to explore multiple sources while researching material for your academic content because if you rely on a single source material you can never get the complete information. Source: questionpro.com Therefore, it is suggested to do complete research by exploring both primary and secondary resources. This way, you will be able to have plenty of other ideas which you can utilize in making your assignments A+.

• Weed out Important Data, and Explain it in your own Words

Now that you are done with the research and you think that you have enough material to rewrite, your next step is to break the important information into chunks. Obviously, you cannot rephrase the source material as it is, you have to find what information is important for your topic and what you can skip. Note important points and facts that can support your discussion and explain them in your own words. You have to be very careful while rewriting the source content because you have to maintain the core meaning of the content throughout. Use synonyms for rephrasing, change the sentence structure to make the content unique and free of plagiarism, and check for grammatical and spelling errors. Let’s take an example to know how you can paraphrase source content successfully: ‘’We’re at a major tipping point in education. According to a recent survey, 48% of teachers admitted that they had considered quitting within the last 30 days. Of that number, 34% said they were thinking about leaving the profession entirely.’’ [Source Forbes.com] Paraphrase Version: ‘’Do you know that a recent survey found that 48% of teachers agreed that they had considered resigning within the last 30 days? On top of that, 34% admitted that they plan to quit the profession entirely.’’ This is how students can paraphrase by changing sentence structure, and replacing words of source content with their synonyms.

• Always Check for Plagiarism

Once you are done paraphrasing, your next step is to check the paraphrased content against plagiarism. Students often submit assignments without checking them for plagiarism. Even if you are paraphrasing it is very important to run the paraphrased content through a plagiarism checker to ensure its uniqueness. Because in manual paraphrasing there are high chances of plagiarism because students cannot replace each word of source content with their synonyms. Also, most students don’t bother changing the sentence structure because they think they can disturb the core sense of the sentences. This way, the paraphrased content contains a good amount of plagiarism. Therefore, it is suggested to always check the paraphrased text for plagiarism before submitting it.

Common Myths about Paraphrasing

So far, we have discussed the tips and tricks for effective paraphrasing now it is time to disclose some common misconceptions about paraphrasing. Students often heard some myths about paraphrasing which they adopt and face trouble with, here are the common myths:

• You Don’t Need to Cite Sources When Paraphrasing

Well, it is the most common misconception about paraphrasing. Many professionals and students think they don’t have to cite sources when they are paraphrasing. It is totally wrong! Whether you are paraphrasing manually or via the tool, you have to cite the sources properly to give acknowledgment to the real author and to save your work from plagiarism. What’s more important is to know the perfect citation style. Students can go for APA, MLA, and Chicago citation styles it totally depends on their subject and field.

• You Just Need to Replace Words with Synonyms and You Are Done

Another most commonly heard myth about paraphrasing is that you just need to replace the words of source text with the synonyms and you are good to go. Well, it is completely wrong! Paraphrasing is a lot more than just replacing words with synonyms. Paraphrasing is about simplifying the content for improved readability and quality. Paraphrasing is about removing grammatical errors, spelling mistakes, and punctuation mistakes to make the content good in understanding.

Manual Paraphrasing Vs. Tool-based Paraphrasing

As we know, paraphrasing means rewriting other authors’ information in your own words without the need to directly quote the words. Manual paraphrasing means you have to follow all the tips that we discussed in the previous sections which means you have to spend a lot of energy and time rewriting the academic content. Also, there are high chances of mistakes in manual paraphrasing because not every student can get and maintain the core meaning and sense of the source content while paraphrasing. On the contrary, tool-based paraphrasing comes with a lot of ease and convenience. Students just need to copy the source material and paste it onto the tool’s input box and let the tool does the remaining work. The tool will analyze and read all the source content before paraphrasing, after reading the content completely the tool rephrases the content with respect to the 4 R’s of paraphrasing – Read, Restate, Recheck, and Repair. Manual paraphrasing takes a lot of time whereas, tool-based paraphrasing takes a few minutes in paraphrasing content whether it's lengthy or short. Look at an example of how the tool paraphrases content: In this image, you can see how the tool replaces words from source text with synonyms and changes the sentence structure of the source text to make it completely unique.

Bottom Line

Paraphrasing is every student's best friend as it allows students to submit their academic content without worrying about plagiarism. Students often get confused about paraphrasing therefore, it is important to know complete information about paraphrasing before you actually start paraphrasing. In this article, we have discussed the effective tips that every student must know before paraphrasing. We have also discussed common misconceptions that students should aware of when paraphrasing. If you want to know what to prefer either manual paraphrasing or tool-based paraphrasing, read the article.