Free MLA Essay Word Template for High School and College Students

Many of you might not know that I taught college-level writing courses for eight years. Of the four classes that I taught (basic comp, first-year comp, advanced comp, and advanced tech writing), teaching Advanced Composition was one of my very favorite things I've ever done. And I've developed a lot of tips, tricks, templates, and content to help my students over the years. One of these templates is for essays in MLA format.

Microsoft Word is great software for writing essays, but the default settings will interfere with a properly formatted essay--especially because Word automatically adds extra spacing each time you hit enter to create a new paragraph (improper spacing may be considered a crime by some teachers).

For MLA formatting, this should be set to "0" and "Double."

I designed a Word Template to ensure perfect formatting every time. Apply STYLES (HOME tab) to each line or paragraph by clicking anywhere on the line or paragraph, and applying the appropriate Style. Each style has been named so you can easily identify which style needs applied to which part of your essay.

Download Mrs. Lee's MLA Essay Word Template and save in your "Custom Word Templates" folder on your hard drive. 

Instructions on how to use this template:

1. Do a search for the folder Custom Office Templates on your computer (hard drive or cloud) and then save this file in that folder. 

2. Open Microsoft Word.

3. Options appear to open files on a HOME tab, including a file option called Blank. The MLA template might show up under New files at the top of the page, but if not, then click on the NEW tab in the left sidebar, and then click on PERSONAL (to the right of "Office"). Scroll until you find Mrs Lee's MLA Essay Template 2021 and then click on it. (Note: by opening the file this way, you are not opening the actual template, but a new doc with the template formatting embedded.)

4. You can always personalize the template (like adding your name in the heading and header) and then re-save it as a Word Template (.dotx) in your Custom Office Templates folder. 

 Or, if it doesn't appear at the top, click the NEW left sidebar, and then click PERSONAL.

Additional tutorials on how to use Styles in MS Word: