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The National Student March 2009
The National Student is the UK's independent, free, national student newspaper.
From The National Student
A Good Blueprint for Any Paper (Try building a house, much less a paper, without one.)THESIS:The foundation of your paper (from a Latin word meaning to place. Remember the story of theman who placed his house upon the sand? Watch out for constructing a paper on shaky ground.)Traditionally a thesis is one or two sentences at the end of your introduction which sum up your main point for the entire paper, in other words, an idea, position, or interpretation worth pointingout, risking even. Your thesis tells your readers in a clear, concise, and interesting way what theycan expect to discover in your text. (Don't attempt to write a perfect thesis on the first try, noteven on the second.) Watch how one can evolve:
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It's hard to write if you haven't been a reader.
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It's hard to write with confidence if you haven't been a reader.
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Many students who have never enjoyed reading find it hard to write.
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Many students who have never enjoyed reading find it hard to write with confidencebecause they have rarely experienced good writing themselves.
If your thesis is supposed to appear at the end of your introduction, where do you start? Attractyour readers' attention.Try creating a scene. Brainstorm the different kinds of scenes film directors create to draw in their audiences, then ask yourself how will you draw in yours? Given our revised thesis about aconnection between reading and writing, we could develop the following introduction:
A ten-year old boy leans forward, his body still but tense. Only his right hand moves. The room isdark. A screen flickers. He is thinking in images, not language, in sounds but not words. Eight years from now, an instructor in an English composition class will ask him to account for histhinking on any number of subjects, and the boy will struggle with the words. If only he could create a video scenario to show the effects of global warming. It would be better anyway, morevivid. Other students will be in this same position, male and female, technologically smart sincechildhood but frustrated with their inability to come up with words as easily as images. Many students who have never enjoyed reading find it hard to write with confidence because they haverarely experienced good writing themselves.
INTRODUCTION:The entrance to your paper.If your thesis is supposed to appear at the end of your introduction, how will you lead up to it?Try attracting your reader's attention in one of the following ways:Set the scene. Imagine the different kinds of scenes film directors create to draw in their audiences. Then imagine how you will try to draw in yours:
A ten-year-old boy leans forward, intent on his flickering computer screen. He thinks in images,not language, in sounds but not words. Eight years from now, an instructor in a college-levelcomposition class will ask him to account for his perspective on any number of subjects, and the boy will struggle. If only he could create a computer scenario to show the effects of globalwarming, he thinks. It would be better anyway, more vivid. Many college students will find ithard to write effectively because they have never been readers.Start with an interesting fact or assertion:According to The National Assessment Education Progress (NACEP) 1998 Reading Report Cardfor the Nation and the States, "Numerous studies have shown that reading development does nottake place in isolation; children develop simultaneously as readers, listeners, speakers, andwriters" (School and Home Factors section, para. 5). If this relationship is so important, what mayhappen to high school students who listen and speak but who spend little time reading andwriting? How well prepared will they be for college-level work? Many college students will findit hard to write effectively because they have never been readers.Start with an interesting question(s):What's the difference between illiteracy and alliteracy? Illiteracy means one is not capable of reading, whereas alliteracy means one is capable of reading but resists whenever possible. Why?An informal survey of college students produces the following answers, "Boring," "Too hard," "Ialways fall asleep." "Better things to do." Too often students assume that not reading meansnothing, such as not bowling or not eating sushi. They fail to realize that reading and writing areconnected. Many college students will find it hard to write effectively because they have never been readers.The most interesting introductions begin indirectly but strategically. Rather than starting out bysaying, "The purpose of this paper is to ...," or "... has been important throughout civilization,"hook your reader with a carefully chosen image/anecdote, a thoughtful piece of information, or simply the right question.ORGANIZATION:The floor plan for your paper, taking into account the available space.Remember the working unit for most written texts is the paragraph (the way a room is for ahouse). Check out this assertion in your non-academic reading. Articles in the newspaper,
Sports Illustrated
, and
Cosmopolitan
count. Song lyrics, closer to poetry, don't.A good paragraph has one topic sentence that connects to your thesis and serves as a foundationfor the paragraph. A predictable structure helps your reader understand your thinking.Three good "floor plans" follow:
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Chronological - simply means the order in which events happen in time. A chronologicalorganization can help you structure a personal narrative, analyze a historical event or person, or write up a lab experiment.
Generally
it's a good idea to start a new paragraphwhenever you move forward or backward in time.
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Topical - helps you discuss the various aspects of a subject, for example, how residents of Jackson County feel about having a shopping mall in Western North Carolina, the prosand cons of freshman parking their cars on campus, or the compelling reasons for including a fine arts cinema in the new performing arts building (a personal favorite).Generally speaking, weaker points precede stronger points and lesser pros and/or cons precede greater pros and/or cons because gradually
building
the significance of your thesis helps keep your reader interested.Start a new paragraph whenever the topic shifts. If a paragraph threatens to take over the page, look for the first logical place to give your readers' eyes a break. On the other hand,if you find yourself ending a paragraph too quickly, take a careful look at our section ondevelopment.Transitional paragraphs are
occasionally
useful for helping a reader to move from onetopic to the next, and they are generally short.
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Comparing and contrasting - helps youanalyze how two or more subjects are similar andhow they differ.One strategy is to first analyze how the subjects are the same and then analyze how theyare different, or vice versa:A student was assigned to write a paper comparing and contrasting popular culture duringthe decline of the Roman Empire with popular culture in the United States at the beginning of the 21
st
century. The
most
interesting part of the paper, the student realizedas she researched both subjects, would be her analysis of the similarities between the twocultures and deciding whether or not the U.S. appeared to be heading for the same fate asthe Roman Empire. How she summed up her findings and what her findings suggestedwould help her to develop a thesis. Because she had been asked to address differences aswell as similarities, the student began her paper by first acknowledging several ways inwhich the Roman Empire and the contemporary U.S. are clearly different. Her thesisread, "Despite the differences 2000 years can create, the behavior of Romans during thedecline of their empire bears an unsettling resemblance to the behavior of contemporaryAmericans."Another strategy for comparing and contrasting two subjects is to analyze several topicscommon to both subjects, one topic at a time:A student was assigned to write a paper comparing and contrasting the female protagonistin a novel written by a male author with the female protagonist in a novel written by afemale author. He chose to look at Emma Bovary in Madame Bovary by GustaveFlaubert and Edna Pontellier in The Awakening by Kate Chopin. Where should he start?In each novel, the protagonist is married, takes a lover, and dies, so the student lookedcarefully at each woman's relationship to her husband, to her lover, and to her death. Ashe organized his topics (husbands, lovers, and death), he first discussed Flaubert'sdepiction of Emma (Madame Bovary being the older book) and then Chopin's depictionof Edna.His thesis read, "Based on the evidence of Madame Bovary by Flaubert and TheAwakening by Chopin, a male author may tend to view a woman's poor choices as flaws
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A Good Blueprint for Any Paper
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| Upload Date: | 07/25/2009 |
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