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How to Write a Strong Introduction & Thesis Statement

An introduction should contain not only a clear thesis statement that describes your main idea, but also a hook that makes the reader want to read your work. Try beginning with one of the following:

1) a startling statistic or unusual fact
2) a vivid description
3) a question
4) a story or quotation
5) a bit of dialog

Here are some examples of introductions written by other 290 students. As you read them, ask yourself, “Does this writing make me want to keep reading?” If the introduction does catch your interest, ask yourself why. If it doesn’t, figure out what the writer could have done to make his/her opening more interesting.

(These introductions contain some grammar errors; try to focus on the message):

When look back on my life, I realized that most of my memories are great, but there is one that changed my life and wasn’t great at all.
I am a woman, and I bleed every month. There are over three billion women on this planet that also bleed every month. Every one knows it. So why do the majority of people pretend that it doesn’t exist?
In teaching others, the teacher needs to hold a few simple qualities; patience, passion, knowledge, compassion, and optimism. Everyone can’t hold all these qualities, which is why not everyone can make a great teacher. As Gandhi believed, one must practice what he/she teaches otherwise she teaches in vain. A woman once walked up to Gandhi and pleaded, “Help my son to stop eating sugar, he won’t listen to me but I know he’ll listen to you.” So Gandhi told the women to bring her son back in two weeks. Two weeks later Gandhi met with the lady’s son. The woman asked confused, “Why did you want to wait two weeks?” He replied, “So I can stop eating sugar myself.”
To many people, sleep is a daily routine. To me, its an ongoing battle.

Note: These writers don’t write, “I am going to write an essay about. . .“ They just jump right into their topics! This is a more interesting and efficient way to begin

Formulating a Thesis

What is a thesis?

            A thesis is the main point, the controlling idea, or the central focus of a piece of writing.
It answers the question, “So what?” In personal reflective writing, the thesis is the significance of the incident or meaning of the experience the writer is describing or narrating. In expository writing, the thesis is what the given information adds up to, your explanation of it, your purpose in presenting it. In persuasive writing, the thesis is the point the writer is eying to prove. A thesis is a promise, fulfilled in the essay.
            Creating a thesis doesn’t necessarily mean coming to a conclusion before you start writing. We don’t start writing bowing everything we want to say because we usually don’t know what we want to say until we’ve said it—until we begin the writing process. It is the process of writing that helps us to discover what we mean and how we want to say it.
            Think of a thesis as a working proposition based on a particular response you have to your subject. Your thesis is not necessarily a statement of fact, but most likely a valid generalization based on a reasoned, well thought out, informed opinion of your own.

Before you can formulate a thesis you must:

1. know your attitude toward or feelings about the subject;
2. know your position, idea, or claim about the subject,
3. ask why the thesis is valid and develop at least three supporting ideas, examples, illusations, etc. to answer that question, and
4. determine whether the thesis reflects the purpose of the discourse—the type of writing you are doing. For example, does the thesis express a judgment, an evaluation? Does it offer a hypothesis to help explain something? Does it propose a solution to a problem? Does it explain the reason or purpose of something?

Now you are ready to formulate your thesis.

Try to state your thesis in one sentence. The sentence may or may not appear in your essay—it may be implicit or explicit—but its formulation wili help you to stay on focus as you write.

All things are difficult before they are easy. Thomas Fuller

Contents:

The Eight Steps to Writing an Essay
How to Write Strong Introductions
Staying on-Topic (keeping focus)
Do's and Don'ts for Writing a Strong Conclusion

Essays / 290 Content / 290 Homepage

Writing Center / Watsonville Integrated Learning Center

English Department / Cabrillo College Homepage