I got my dissertation mar back today and it was 67. This was the minimum I needed to maintain my hopes of a distinction overall. One of the main criticisms was that my syntax and grammar were erroneous and that it needed proofreading. That was a bit surprising as it was proofread by multiple parties. Still, I think I may have tendency to make my writing to 'flowery,' for lack of a better word. Perhaps I put too much weight on what I perceive is an aesthetically pleasing sentence at the expense of its message. Overall though they said it was 'very good.' However, I still feel somewhat disappointed but maybe I'm being too hard on myself. My main frustration is that some of the criticisms could've been addresses if my supervisor had actually met with me as I requested during the critical last two weeks of writing. All that's left now is my composition portfolio which I need at least 66 in. The deadline for this is September 1st. I am reasonably confident I can get 70+ for this as my music has so far got me my highest marks. Fingers crossed.
There's an app for that...and it is REALLY fun.
Thanks for sharing that site, I never really know how to improve in writing and this might help give me some direction. Though maybe I should lurk more in #writebetterdammit ;)
I did actually use this before I submitted and got a pretty good score. Either way, I brought up the issue of not being able to see my tutor sufficiently before hand-in in a meeting with him today. He said he felt it was a valid and reasonable observation and that it would be brought to the attention of the other marker and the external examiner.
I found I had a real problem with weasel words when writing to meet a word count, perhaps there's some cruft accumulating in your work? I'd do a CTRL+F for the example phrases and try to remove them -- preferably through expanding the sentence to include more information.