Writing and research guides
Practical walkthroughs for the assignments that take the longest — essays, cited research papers, and college applications.
How to lower a Turnitin similarity score by fixing the writing
Start with the matched passages, not a target percentage. A checklist for quotations, paraphrases, references, and matches to your own earlier work.
What is the easiest way to write a thesis statement?
Start with a question you can answer from the material, then make a claim you can support. A practical method for getting past a topic-only thesis.
How to make an essay longer without adding fluff
Find what the argument has skipped before adding words. Six useful ways to develop a short draft, with an original paragraph example.
How to access paywalled research papers for free
A legal route around the dead end of a publisher payment screen: find access you already have or a freely available version of the same paper.
How to turn your notes into practice questions
Use your notes to build questions you can answer before looking at the explanation. A practical method for checking what you understand.
How to ask a teacher for an extension without overexplaining
Ask early when possible, make a specific request, and keep working while you wait. Adapt these examples to the actual situation and course policy.
How to get Google Classroom reminders before things are due
Classroom only warns you 24 hours before work is due, and only if notifications are on. Here is how to get earlier reminders without another app.
How to see all your assignments in Google Classroom
Every class, one list. Where Classroom’s To-do page is, what Assigned, Missing and Done mean, and a five-minute weekly check.
How to get homework reminders by text
Neither Google Classroom nor Google Calendar will text you. Here is what will, from built-in phone tricks to an AI that texts you first.
How to remove hidden characters from ChatGPT text
Copied AI text can carry characters you cannot see. What they are, where they come from, and how to strip them in seconds without breaking emoji or other languages.
How to remove asterisks from ChatGPT text (and keep the formatting)
The asterisks and pound signs are markdown, the formatting code chat apps write in. How to turn them into plain text or real Google Docs formatting.
How to check an essay against a rubric with AI
A useful rubric check shows which passage meets each criterion, what is missing, and what to revise next. An unexplained score is not enough.
How to research with AI without fake citations
Start with sources you can open, connect every claim to evidence, and build the bibliography from the sources you actually used.
Homework stacking up? How to dig out
When you are behind on six things at once, the problem is not speed. It is that you keep starting the wrong one. Here is how to triage.
Essay due tomorrow? Here is the plan
You have one night. The order matters more under pressure, not less. Here is what to do with each hour and what to cut.
Need help with AP Seminar?
Whichever part you are stuck on, the fix is usually the same: the course rewards argument, and most students are still summarizing.
Need help with AP Research?
Most AP Research trouble traces back to one decision made in September. Find where you are stuck and what the actual fix is.
Auto typer stopped in Google Docs? Check these causes first
A symptom-by-symptom recovery guide for extension typing and cloud jobs, including how to resume without repeating the text already inserted.
How to type prepared text into Google Docs tables and existing sections
A placement workflow for a document that already has headings or a table. Includes a small practice example and checks before and after the run.
The back-to-school AI toolkit
Spend one evening in week one setting this up and you will save yourself a semester of scrambling.
How to write an essay faster
Most of the time in an essay goes to staring at a blank page and rewriting the introduction. Both are fixable.
MLA 9 vs APA 7: a side-by-side guide
Both styles do the same job differently. Here are the differences that cost marks when you mix them up.
How to write a research paper, step by step
A research paper is eight stages. Doing them out of order is what makes it take three times as long as it should.
AP Research: how to approach the IRR
The IRR rewards a narrow question you can actually answer with a method you can actually run. Most of the difficulty is upstream of the writing.
AP Seminar: how to approach the IWA
The IWA is graded on argument, not on how much you read. The most common failure is a paper that summarizes its sources instead of using them.
How to beat writer’s block
Being stuck is rarely mysterious. It is almost always one of four things, and each has a different fix.