Thesis - PowerPoint Presentation

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ThesisDetailsOrganization

English Department, Brenda WhiteSlide2

Guidelines for Every Essay

Every effective essay has a THESIS.

A statement where the writer presents his or her position on

an essay subject.

The thesis drives the

train

; it determines what does and does not belong in an essay. It should be both specific and comprehensive.

Every effective essay has ORGANIZATION.

Essays are organized chronologically,

emphatically,

spatially

,

or some other meaningful way. Organization successfully guides the reader.

Every effective essay uses DETAILS to flesh out its ideas.

Details

help explain

the big ideas. Details give examples, tell

anecdotes,

and give explanations or definitions. Details give life to big ideas

. Details help you show the main idea.Slide3

Thesis 101

To even consider writing a thesis, the writer must have identified

an essay

topic.

Ask yourself why you chose this topic. Is there something about this topic that is compelling? Fascinating? Interesting? Controversial?

Write a thesis statement that reflects what you feel is true about some aspect of this topic, then prove that statement in your essay.

The thesis statement must be in the introduction. There is no magic best place for a thesis

statement,

though. It might be the first sentence of the introduction, or it might be the last sentence of the introduction, or it might appear somewhere in the middle. The thesis should be in the position where it is most impactful. So, you decide.Slide4

Thesis or Not a Thesis?

A thesis is

NOT HIGHLY OPINIONATED

.

NOT: With characteristic clumsiness, campus officials bumbled their way through the recent budget crisis.

BUT: Campus officials had trouble managing the recent budget crisis effectively.

Do not be overly dogmatic, critical, or overstated when writing a thesis. A thesis should be solidly stated and have an attitude, an arguable point of view that can be supported with evidence in the essay.Slide5

Thesis or Not a Thesis?A thesis is

NOT AN ANNOUNCEMENT

.

Don’t simply announce the topic of the essay and forget to include your attitude toward that subject.

NOT: My essay will discuss

a daycare facility on

campus.

BUT: This

school should (not) provide a daycare facility for staff and students.

NOT: Handgun legislation will be the topic of my paper.

BUT: Banning handguns is the first step toward controlling crime in America.Slide6

Thesis or Not a Thesis?

A thesis is

NOT A STATEMENT OF FACT

.

If the thesis is a fact, that means there is really no room for discussion of the issue.

NOT: Many businesses pollute the environment.

BUT: Tax penalties should be levied against businesses that pollute the environment.

NOT: Movies nowadays are often violent.

BUT: Movie violence provides a healthy outlet for aggression.Slide7

Thesis or Not a Thesis?

A thesis is

NOT A BROAD STATEMENT

Statements that are too broad tell the reader that you don’t really know what you want to talk about.

NOT: Nowadays, high school education is often meaningless.

BUT:

Across the country, high

school diplomas have been devalued by grade inflation.

NOT: Newspapers cater to the taste of the American public.

BUT: The success of

USA Today

indicates that people want newspapers that are easy to read and entertaining.Slide8

Try it out …The general topic that has been identified concerns the special problems that parents face raising children today.

Brainstorm and discuss any issues that fall into this broad

category, then choose one.

Land on one aspect which piques your interest and narrow down your topic with a statement that you can discuss and defend.

Write down the statement.Slide9

Is your statement … ?

… overly opinionated? If so, how are you going to change it to be less opinionated and more argumentative?

… simply an announcement of what the essay is about? Fix that; take a stand.

… a fact, a true statement with nothing really left to be said? Undo that and start again with an argument.

… broad and too big to handle? Be more specific by identifying an aspect that is key to your argument.

…none of the above but rather in the Goldilocks Zone? Good for you!Slide10

Details 101Details provide the support that upholds your thesis and makes it more interesting and believable for the reader.

Details and support come with many names: examples, facts, statistics, personal observations or experience, anecdotes, expert opinions, quotations, and other types not named.

All these are devices that assist the writer in proving the argument in the thesis. That’s what it’s all about.Slide11

Let details speak for you.When a person asks you why you feel the way you do about the death penalty or concealed carry laws or legalizing marijuana or any other issue, chances are you have an anecdote or a personal observation or a statistic that makes you believe what you do. Those are details. They support your argument.

Writing is more formal than speaking, but they follow many of the same rules. Back up your big ideas with details, examples, quotes evidence , support …. Show the reader that you know your stuff and deserve to be believed.Slide12

Details might look like this …

People have reasons for becoming involved in the environmental movement: They can make a difference;

t

hey believe the situation endangers their or their children’s health; they think their property value is affected; they feel deceived by officials’ actions or inactions.

Give

examples

of successful recycling efforts.

Give

facts

about a neighborhood whose well water was contaminated by industrial runoff which affected their health.

Give

statistics

showing the number of environmentally-aware citizens and citizens groups.

Personal experience

can tell how you got involved.Slide13

Details should be …

RELEVANT, UNIFIED –

stay focused on the topic, point

SPECIFIC –

helps pin down the details to the

main idea

ADEQUATE –

don’t leave the reader needing more information

DRAMATIC –

humans love drama, but don’t go overboard

ACCURATE –

you lose credibility if even one detail is not accurate

REPRESENTATIVE –

rely on typical, usual evidence, not flukes

WELL DOCUMENTED IF BORROWED –

don’t use someone else’s ideas and call them your own. Give credit where it is due.Slide14

Presenting the detailsA paragraph is constructed. It begins with a

topic sentence

. This topic sentence is the focus of the supporting details of that entire paragraph. The topic sentence should be directly related to the thesis statement.

The other sentences in that paragraph all support the topic sentence. These are the

details

and the supporting information.

The details that are used should all be

relevant

to the topic sentence. If they are not, question whether or not they belong there or elsewhere.

Resist the urge to elaborate and get off the track with an irrelevant example or irrelevant facts. Stay focused on the topic at hand.Slide15

Paragraph exampleTHESIS: Many aspects of life are affected by pollution.

When living in the country and drinking water from a well, that well is a lifeline and must be monitored and tested to insure its safety for a family’s use. It is normal to depend on the purity of well water, but when adults and children in one household became sick and the water developed a strange odor, they had the well water tested. The results showed that the well had been contaminated by a substance commonly used as a solvent, the same type of solvent that was used by a new industry that had opened in the area a few months previous. Some neighbors had the same odor problem, and they also had their wells tested. Now there was a general area of well water contamination identified within a specific area coincidental to the opening of the industrial plant. Slide16

Using patterns of development

Main ideas and their details often fall into a pattern of development. These patterns present the details in a specific order or using a specific process to make the point.

More than one pattern of development can be used in an essay. Use the patterns as a guide when constructing your essay (textbook page 43).

On the following slide are patterns of development followed by a suggestion of a topic that is appropriate to it using “issues involving babysitting and child care” as its general topic. Use these guidelines to help focus on the type of development that is correct for a specific paragraph or an entire essay that you write.Slide17

Patterns of DevelopmentDESCRIPTION:

Details about a child who, while being babysat, was badly hurt playing on a backyard swing

NARRATION:

Story about a friend who babysat a child who became ill and was worsened by the friend’s remedies

ILLUSTRATION:

Examples of potential babysitting problems: infant rolls off a changing table, toddler sticks objects into an outlet, child is bitten by a neighborhood dog

DIVISION-CLASSIFICATION:

A typical babysitting evening is divided into stages:

playing

with the kids, putting them to bed, dealing with nightmares.Slide18

Patterns of DevelopmentPROCESS ANALYSIS:

Step-by-step account of what a babysitter should do if a child becomes injured or ill

COMPARISON-CONTRAST:

Contrast between two babysitters, one prepared and one not prepared; Comparison of two babysitters’ styles, one playful and one authoritative

CAUSE-EFFECT:

The reasons for temper tantrums and their effect on the inexperienced babysitter

DEFINITION:

What is meant by a “skilled” babysitter?

ARGUMENTATION:

A proposal for a babysitting program to be offered by a local community centerSlide19

Organization 101

Pulling together all the evidence you have generated into a logical essay might seem daunting, but with a few steps and some thought, it can come together nicely.

When deciding how to organize any paper, consider the four most common organizational techniques: chronological, spatial, emphatic, simple-to-complex.

Weigh your topic against each of these techniques to come up with the one that will serve you best.Slide20

Chronological organization

CHRONOLOGICAL:

Start at one point and give events in time order.

With narration or process analysis patterns, a writer will commonly use chronological organization. A writer might tell a story from what happens first to what happens last, or a writer might describe a process beginning with the first step and ending with the last.

However, a narration might include flashbacks or flash forwards in which case the organization is not completely chronological. If these are used, the writer needs to be very careful that the reader knows a flashback or flash forward is occurring and exactly where it figures into the chronology of the story. Transitions are critical.

A process analysis might include what-ifs along the way.Slide21

Spatial organizationSPATIAL: Begin at one point in a place, and describe elements as you move around or through a space.

This is particularly appropriate for description.

Spatial organization is flexible, but it should remain systematic, e.g., describe a city as seen from the airport, from the taxi, from the hotel, from the street

.Slide22

Emphatic organizationEMPHATIC: Start with the least important ideas and save the most compelling ideas for last.

This is based on the psychological principle that what a person reads or hears last is remembered best.

This can be very effective in argumentative or persuasive essays and in papers developed through examples.Slide23

Simple-to-complex organization

SIMPLE-TO-COMPLEX:

This essay begins with relatively simple concepts and proceed to complex ideas.

By beginning with well-supported simple ideas that are readily accepted, a rapport is built with the reader. Then, adding less simple and more complex ideas that are well grounded retains that rapport and audience interest.Slide24

Nothing beats an outline.There is no magic to deciding which organizational technique to use, but one thing is certain: When you are ready to put the facts together in logical groups, nothing beats an outline.

Outlines are so easy to accomplish on computers. Make it easy on yourself and use all the available tools such as cut and paste and the outlining function on your word processing program.

Use the traditional outline which is the one with Roman numerals, capital letters, numbers, small letters …, but you will

often use

only the first two levels.

Entirely

sentence outlines are extremely helpful to the writing of an essay. Use one of these.Slide25

I. Introduction

Write the thesis statement in its entirety here.

In a sentence, write the first main

idea.

In a sentence, write the second main

idea.

In a sentence, write the third main

idea.

Roman numerals become paragraphs, and the capital letters become components of those paragraphs.

I. represents the introduction;

II

., III., IV., (etc.), represent

all the body paragraphs; use as many as are needed;

V

. (or th

e final section),

represents the conclusion.Slide26

II. Main idea and details

II. Write the topic sentence

for the first

main idea

in

its entirety here.

Details should

be relevant and focused.

In

a sentence or significant phrase, write the

details below

.

In a sentence or significant phrase, write the

first detail

here.

In a sentence or significant phrase, write the

second detail

here.

In a sentence or significant phrase, write the third detail here. (etc.)

REPEAT THIS STEP AS MANY TIME AS IS NEEDED TO COMPLETE THE BODY OF YOUR ESSAY.Slide27

V. Conclusion

V. Write

a sentence

that echoes

your thesis

statement. This is not an exact repeat of the thesis, but rather a look back at how the essay has proved your thesis to be true.

In a sentence or significant phrase, comment on the first main idea.

In a sentence or significant phrase,

comment on the second main idea.

In a sentence or significant phrase,

comment on the third main idea.

Some main ideas can be combined, but all should be touched on and looked back on in the conclusion

.

Here is where a personal comment goes.Slide28

Peace, and

Good Storytelling