How to Start a Research Paper: Guide with Examples

26 Aug.,2024

 

How to Start a Research Paper: Guide with Examples

Beginning is always the hardest part of an assignment. The introduction should not be the first thing you begin to write when starting to work on an essay. First, tons of research should be conducted &#; in order for your paper to be good. Only then you will be able to extract the main points of your work, and introduce them to your readers. A good introduction will also include your personal opinion of the problem, and, therefore, will make the writing easier overall. Let's dive into the details with admission essay writing services.

Puhuasheng are exported all over the world and different industries with quality first. Our belief is to provide our customers with more and better high value-added products. Let's create a better future together.

What Is a Research Paper?

A research paper is a type of writing in which the author does an independent analysis of the topic and describes the findings from that investigation. Furthermore, one will have to identify the weaknesses and strengths of the subject and evaluate them accordingly.

Don't Know How to Start Your

Research Paper?

Head on over to Pro. Our research paper writing service can assist you with writing and polishing up any of the work that you write.

Get Paper

A good way to write an introduction for a research paper is to introduce your reader to the topic by telling them what you are writing about. Then, make sure you include an interesting fact, or some surprising statistical data, so that your reader will be hooked and will continue to read your research paper. Treat your essay introduction like an advertisement for a product you want to sell&#;if your advertisement is bad, the sales won&#;t be great. The same goes for a bad introduction; if it does not intrigue readers, they might lose interest in your paper.

The beginning is always the hardest part of an assignment. Regardless of if you are writing a small resume education section or a full-blown research paper - following the correct steps is very important. The introduction should not be the first thing you begin to write when starting to work on an essay.

You might also be interested in getting more info about HOW TO WRITE A RESEARCH PAPER

Introduction Paragraph Outline

Present Your Essay Topic

The base of every essay is its topic. What you are writing about should always be a reflection of your topic. Simply start off your introduction by telling your readers, in a simple and accessible language, what it is you are writing your research paper about. Although, we suggest you include a &#;trigger&#; when introducing the topic of your paper. A personal reference, or a story that relates to the essay topic, are options for a good way to link plain text to people&#;s emotions. So, feel free to write sincerely, as if you were talking to a friend.

The best strategy to start your introduction is by writing a broad topic presentation, then gradually narrow it down to what you would like to focus on exactly. It will put your topic into perspective for readers&#; general understanding. When writing your research paper, make sure to include your opinion on the issue in your introduction. This will make your topic sound more personal and it will likely become more important to your audience as well.

Provide Background Information and Context

The topic you begin writing about is likely very familiar to you, as it is expected that you have done plenty of research. But what about your readers? For the most part, the amount of context is determined by what your audience already knows&#;though, let&#;s focus on a bigger assortment of readers, to make sure everyone&#;s needs are met. Imagine that you are part of your audience. Read the information you provided in the introduction. Is this sufficient? Does it leave gaps and unanswered questions in your research? Your job as a writer is to provide the perfect background to your topic, which gives readers just enough information to be able to grasp your topic and enjoy your research paper to the fullest. Another extreme you should avoid is giving too much context&#;consequently making the audience feel bored right from the introduction. Write your essay as something that you would enjoy reading yourself, like a story, but not an academic research paper.

Explain the Importance of Your Research

There is no doubt that after plenty of research you are an expert in your field. But what about your readers? In the introduction you need to showcase the extent of your research and write about the work you have completed. This will also help your readers understand that your ideas are supported by other scholars, and you share their views in your paper.

Make sure to write about all the works you have studied in order to persuade readers of your expertise. For your introduction, simply use the names you are referencing, or their most important works, so that the audience does not feel overwhelmed. It is also necessary to cite all your sources&#;in order to avoid academic plagiarism.

Looking to Have Your Work Proofread or Interested in Our Service?

Simply chat with our academic writer to pay for essay.

Get Help Now

Make Your Rationale Work

Rationale is the most important part of the beginning of your paper. Explain to readers the reasoning behind your research paper&#;the importance of this is a guarantee that they will keep reading and appreciate your topic. In the introduction, you need to write an explanation of how your paper fits into all the research that has already been done in that field; this shows your audience the importance of your essay and the role your research plays in the field overall.

Show the Significance of Your Research

You, and only you, understand how important your research is. The next step of your introduction is to prove to your audience how important it is. Include the basic, and the most important literature, you support your ideas with. This will show the readers your solid analytical skills, your writing capabilities, and your ability to sort out information to deliver the most important points for your paper. And the final part of the introduction is to simply explain why your research is important to the field, to society, to the whole world, and, most importantly, to the readers. When a person can relate to an idea, it is almost always a guarantee that your argument will be persuasive and have a positive outcome.

Make Sure Your Thesis Is Clear

A research paper introduction uses primary sources and data to support its thesis statement. A research paper&#;s thesis statement has a lot in common with a thesis for an essay, or other non-research assignment. The difference lies in the fact that in a research thesis, you gather evidence from valid sources to prove your perspective on a topic. Despite the fact that you support your thoughts by sources, the idea for your thesis in your introduction should be original and your own, as it reflects the way you think.

Here is a quick checklist for writing a thesis statement:

  • Remember, the thesis is your argument. Make sure it sounds assertive.
  • Write two to three versions of your thesis and choose the best one.
  • Share your thesis with a neutral person&#;to get a different point of view.
  • Discuss your thesis with others; they might have good ideas as well.
  • It should appear in your introduction, and be restated in your conclusion.

If you're looking to free yourself from the burden of academic writing, consider our research papers for sale, offering a convenient solution to meet your scholarly needs efficiently.

Research Paper Title Page

MLA Title Page

Here are some tips from our writing team on how to format your research paper MLA title page:

  • The title page is double spaced and the text needs to be centred.
  • Write the name of your university or college.
  • Skip about one-third of the page down and type your research paper title&#;include a subtitle if you have one.
  • Skip several lines down and type your name, your course name and number, your instructor&#;s name, and your paper&#;s due date.
MLA title page example

APA Title Page

  • Place a running head in your page&#;s header:
  • Use the label &#;Running head:&#; then, put your shortened title (IN UPPERCASE LETTERS), and align it all to the left.
  • Place the page number in this same header, but align it to the right, and begin with page number 1.
  • The header should be 1 inch from the top. Some teachers say 1/2 inch is okay as well.
  • Place your paper&#;s title in the upper half of the page, centred. Capitalize the first letter of all of the important words in your title.
  • Place your University&#;s name below your name, double-spaced.
APA title page example

Read also our research proposal example APA.

Final Thoughts

Congratulations on finishing your research paper! Answer these questions to avoid careless mistakes.

  • Are all of your quotations, paraphrases, and summaries accurate?
  • Are all of your references accurate?
  • Is your format the proper format assigned by your instructor?
  • Are all the concepts defined and easily understood by an average reader?
  • Is your &#;hook&#; good enough for the reader to become interested?
  • Is there a structure to your introduction that is easy to navigate for the reader?
  • Does your introduction give a good idea of what your paper is about?

And here are several tips for your help:

If you need, you can hire a coursework, buy research paper or other specialist at our research proposal writing service. All you need to do is just leave us a notice like 'write my paper for me' or something else.

Research Paper Introduction Example

Now that you have a solid idea about the introduction of a research paper, let&#;s take a look at some examples from our writers. They will help you see how all of the rules we presented above work in practice.&#;

Research Paper Introduction Example: Should Parents Be Held Accountable for the Criminal Acts of Their Children?
Recently, youth gang connected attacks have been occurring in an increasing prevalence, with some even causing deaths, such as the killing of a college student at Suburbs East. Such occurrences have made a lot of people to wonder about the origin of those violent actions, with much of the extent of guilt being put on the parents of such adolescents. In any event, one has to question whether the parents should be penalized for the offenses of their kids.

Some people believe that parents should be held responsible for the criminal acts of their offspring because parents are mostly accountable for the education and upbringing of their kids, and frequently impact the actions and behavior of their children until they become mature and independent. This is because they are almost always the ones that raise their kids after birth. As such, it is believed that parents start to influence the ethical range of their children from a young age, and one&#;s ethics are critically impacted by the way parents act and their personalities
(Gratz, 169).

This logic can make parents responsible for their children if they do wrong later on &#; because they are understood to not have raised their child in the right way. Furthermore, there is an argument that children are virtually completely controlled by their parents, as they are apt to want to make their parents happy, and they would, therefore, listen to whatever they are told to do or how they are told to behave (Michael, Andrew and Michael, 4). This, in turn, makes many people think that parents should always be the ones to be blamed for the criminal acts of their children, as they believe that they have the power to warn and control them.

Need Some Help with Your Research Paper?

A research paper is a very challenging task to complete. The introduction is a crucial piece of it: it ensures that the reader is interested and will enjoy your paper. If you are still struggling with any part of your essay, remember that you can always pay for a research paper. We are always here to give you a helping hand to make your life easier.

Find Your Writer

9.3 Putting It Together: Steps to Complete Your Introduction

9.3 Putting It Together: Steps to Complete Your Introduction

Learning Objectives

  1. Clearly identify why an audience should listen to a speaker.
  2. Discuss how you can build your credibility during a speech.
  3. Understand how to write a clear thesis statement.
  4. Design an effective preview of your speech&#;s content for your audience.

Once you have captured your audience&#;s attention, it&#;s important to make the rest of your introduction interesting, and use it to lay out the rest of the speech. In this section, we are going to explore the five remaining parts of an effective introduction: linking to your topic, reasons to listen, stating credibility, thesis statement, and preview.

Link to Topic

After the attention-getter, the second major part of an introduction is called the link to topic. The link to topic is the shortest part of an introduction and occurs when a speaker demonstrates how an attention-getting device relates to the topic of a speech. Often the attention-getter and the link to topic are very clear. For example, if you look at the attention-getting device example under historical reference above, you&#;ll see that the first sentence brings up the history of the Vietnam War and then shows us how that war can help us understand the Iraq War. In this case, the attention-getter clearly flows directly to the topic. However, some attention-getters need further explanation to get to the topic of the speech. For example, both of the anecdote examples (the girl falling into the manhole while texting and the boy and the filberts) need further explanation to connect clearly to the speech topic (i.e., problems of multitasking in today&#;s society).

Let&#;s look at the first anecdote example to demonstrate how we could go from the attention-getter to the topic.

In July , a high school girl named Alexa Longueira was walking along a main boulevard near her home on Staten Island, New York, typing in a message on her cell . Not paying attention to the world around her, she took a step and fell right into an open manhole. This anecdote illustrates the problem that many people are facing in today&#;s world. We are so wired into our technology that we forget to see what&#;s going on around us&#;like a big hole in front of us.

In this example, the third sentence here explains that the attention-getter was an anecdote that illustrates a real issue. The fourth sentence then introduces the actual topic of the speech.

Let&#;s now examine how we can make the transition from the parable or fable attention-getter to the topic:

If you are looking for more details, kindly visit Step-in Post.

The ancient Greek writer Aesop told a fable about a boy who put his hand into a pitcher of filberts. The boy grabbed as many of the delicious nuts as he possibly could. But when he tried to pull them out, his hand wouldn&#;t fit through the neck of the pitcher because he was grasping so many filberts. Instead of dropping some of them so that his hand would fit, he burst into tears and cried about his predicament. The moral of the story? &#;Don&#;t try to do too much at once.&#; In today&#;s world, many of us are us are just like the boy putting his hand into the pitcher. We are constantly trying to grab so much or do so much that it prevents us from accomplishing our goals. I would like to show you three simple techniques to manage your time so that you don&#;t try to pull too many filberts from your pitcher.

In this example, we added three new sentences to the attention-getter to connect it to the speech topic.

Reasons to Listen

Once you have linked an attention-getter to the topic of your speech, you need to explain to your audience why your topic is important. We call this the &#;why should I care?&#; part of your speech because it tells your audience why the topic is directly important to them. Sometimes you can include the significance of your topic in the same sentence as your link to the topic, but other times you may need to spell out in one or two sentences why your specific topic is important.

People in today&#;s world are very busy, and they do not like their time wasted. Nothing is worse than having to sit through a speech that has nothing to do with you. Imagine sitting through a speech about a new software package you don&#;t own and you will never hear of again. How would you react to the speaker? Most of us would be pretty annoyed at having had our time wasted in this way. Obviously, this particular speaker didn&#;t do a great job of analyzing her or his audience if the audience isn&#;t going to use the software package&#;but even when speaking on a topic that is highly relevant to the audience, speakers often totally forget to explain how and why it is important.

Appearing Credible

The next part of a speech is not so much a specific &#;part&#; as an important characteristic that needs to be pervasive throughout your introduction and your entire speech. As a speaker, you want to be seen as credible (competent, trustworthy, and caring/having goodwill). As mentioned earlier in this chapter, credibility is ultimately a perception that is made by your audience. While your audience determines whether they perceive you as competent, trustworthy, and caring/having goodwill, there are some strategies you can employ to make yourself appear more credible.

First, to make yourself appear competent, you can either clearly explain to your audience why you are competent about a given subject or demonstrate your competence by showing that you have thoroughly researched a topic by including relevant references within your introduction. The first method of demonstrating competence&#;saying it directly&#;is only effective if you are actually a competent person on a given subject. If you are an undergraduate student and you are delivering a speech about the importance of string theory in physics, unless you are a prodigy of some kind, you are probably not a recognized expert on the subject. Conversely, if your number one hobby in life is collecting memorabilia about the Three Stooges, then you may be an expert about the Three Stooges. However, you would need to explain to your audience your passion for collecting Three Stooges memorabilia and how this has made you an expert on the topic.

If, on the other hand, you are not actually a recognized expert on a topic, you need to demonstrate that you have done your homework to become more knowledgeable than your audience about your topic. The easiest way to demonstrate your competence is through the use of appropriate references from leading thinkers and researchers on your topic. When you demonstrate to your audience that you have done your homework, they are more likely to view you as competent.

The second characteristic of credibility, trustworthiness, is a little more complicated than competence, for it ultimately relies on audience perceptions. One way to increase the likelihood that a speaker will be perceived as trustworthy is to use reputable sources. If you&#;re quoting Dr. John Smith, you need to explain who Dr. John Smith is so your audience will see the quotation as being more trustworthy. As speakers we can easily manipulate our sources into appearing more credible than they actually are, which would be unethical. When you are honest about your sources with your audience, they will trust you and your information more so than when you are ambiguous. The worst thing you can do is to out-and-out lie about information during your speech. Not only is lying highly unethical, but if you are caught lying, your audience will deem you untrustworthy and perceive everything you are saying as untrustworthy. Many speakers have attempted to lie to an audience because it will serve their own purposes or even because they believe their message is in their audience&#;s best interest, but lying is one of the fastest ways to turn off an audience and get them to distrust both the speaker and the message.

The third characteristic of credibility to establish during the introduction is the sense of caring/goodwill. While some unethical speakers can attempt to manipulate an audience&#;s perception that the speaker cares, ethical speakers truly do care about their audiences and have their audience&#;s best interests in mind while speaking. Often speakers must speak in front of audiences that may be hostile toward the speaker&#;s message. In these cases, it is very important for the speaker to explain that he or she really does believe her or his message is in the audience&#;s best interest. One way to show that you have your audience&#;s best interests in mind is to acknowledge disagreement from the start:

Today I&#;m going to talk about why I believe we should enforce stricter immigration laws in the United States. I realize that many of you will disagree with me on this topic. I used to believe that open immigration was a necessity for the United States to survive and thrive, but after researching this topic, I&#;ve changed my mind. While I may not change all of your minds today, I do ask that you listen with an open mind, set your personal feelings on this topic aside, and judge my arguments on their merits.

While clearly not all audience members will be open or receptive to opening their minds and listening to your arguments, by establishing that there is known disagreement, you are telling the audience that you understand their possible views and are not trying to attack their intellect or their opinions.

Thesis Statement

A thesis statement is a short, declarative sentence that states the purpose, intent, or main idea of a speech. A strong, clear thesis statement is very valuable within an introduction because it lays out the basic goal of the entire speech. We strongly believe that it is worthwhile to invest some time in framing and writing a good thesis statement. You may even want to write your thesis statement before you even begin conducting research for your speech. While you may end up rewriting your thesis statement later, having a clear idea of your purpose, intent, or main idea before you start searching for research will help you focus on the most appropriate material. To help us understand thesis statements, we will first explore their basic functions and then discuss how to write a thesis statement.

Basic Functions of a Thesis Statement

A thesis statement helps your audience by letting them know &#;in a nutshell&#; what you are going to talk about. With a good thesis statement you will fulfill four basic functions: you express your specific purpose, provide a way to organize your main points, make your research more effective, and enhance your delivery.

Express Your Specific Purpose

To orient your audience, you need to be as clear as possible about your meaning. A strong thesis will prepare your audience effectively for the points that will follow. Here are two examples:

  1. &#;Today, I want to discuss academic cheating.&#; (weak example)
  2. &#;Today, I will clarify exactly what plagiarism is and give examples of its different types so that you can see how it leads to a loss of creative learning interaction.&#; (strong example)

The weak statement will probably give the impression that you have no clear position about your topic because you haven&#;t said what that position is. Additionally, the term &#;academic cheating&#; can refer to many behaviors&#;acquiring test questions ahead of time, copying answers, changing grades, or allowing others to do your coursework&#;so the specific topic of the speech is still not clear to the audience.

The strong statement not only specifies plagiarism but also states your specific concern (loss of creative learning interaction).

Provide a Way to Organize Your Main Points

A thesis statement should appear, almost verbatim, toward the end of the introduction to a speech. A thesis statement helps the audience get ready to listen to the arrangement of points that follow. Many speakers say that if they can create a strong thesis sentence, the rest of the speech tends to develop with relative ease. On the other hand, when the thesis statement is not very clear, creating a speech is an uphill battle.

When your thesis statement is sufficiently clear and decisive, you will know where you stand about your topic and where you intend to go with your speech. Having a clear thesis statement is especially important if you know a great deal about your topic or you have strong feelings about it. If this is the case for you, you need to know exactly what you are planning on talking about in order to fit within specified time limitations. Knowing where you are and where you are going is the entire point in establishing a thesis statement; it makes your speech much easier to prepare and to present.

Let&#;s say you have a fairly strong thesis statement, and that you&#;ve already brainstormed a list of information that you know about the topic. Chances are your list is too long and has no focus. Using your thesis statement, you can select only the information that (1) is directly related to the thesis and (2) can be arranged in a sequence that will make sense to the audience and will support the thesis. In essence, a strong thesis statement helps you keep useful information and weed out less useful information.

Make Your Research More Effective

If you begin your research with only a general topic in mind, you run the risk of spending hours reading mountains of excellent literature about your topic. However, mountains of literature do not always make coherent speeches. You may have little or no idea of how to tie your research all together, or even whether you should tie it together. If, on the other hand, you conduct your research with a clear thesis statement in mind, you will be better able to zero in only on material that directly relates to your chosen thesis statement. Let&#;s look at an example that illustrates this point:

Many traffic accidents involve drivers older than fifty-five.

While this statement may be true, you could find industrial, medical, insurance literature that can drone on ad infinitum about the details of all such accidents in just one year. Instead, focusing your thesis statement will help you narrow the scope of information you will be searching for while gathering information. Here&#;s an example of a more focused thesis statement:

Three factors contribute to most accidents involving drivers over fifty-five years of age: failing eyesight, slower reflexes, and rapidly changing traffic conditions.

This framing is somewhat better. This thesis statement at least provides three possible main points and some keywords for your electronic catalog search. However, if you want your audience to understand the context of older people at the wheel, consider something like:

Mature drivers over fifty-five years of age must cope with more challenging driving conditions than existed only one generation ago: more traffic moving at higher speeds, the increased imperative for quick driving decisions, and rapidly changing ramp and cloverleaf systems. Because of these challenges, I want my audience to believe that drivers over the age of sixty-five should be required to pass a driving test every five years.

This framing of the thesis provides some interesting choices. First, several terms need to be defined, and these definitions might function surprisingly well in setting the tone of the speech. Your definitions of words like &#;generation,&#; &#;quick driving decisions,&#; and &#;cloverleaf systems&#; could jolt your audience out of assumptions they have taken for granted as truth.

Second, the framing of the thesis provides you with a way to describe the specific changes as they have occurred between, say, and . How much, and in what ways, have the volume and speed of traffic changed? Why are quick decisions more critical now? What is a &#;cloverleaf,&#; and how does any driver deal cognitively with exiting in the direction seemingly opposite to the desired one? Questions like this, suggested by your own thesis statement, can lead to a strong, memorable speech.

Enhance Your Delivery

When your thesis is not clear to you, your listeners will be even more clueless than you are&#;but if you have a good clear thesis statement, your speech becomes clear to your listeners. When you stand in front of your audience presenting your introduction, you can vocally emphasize the essence of your speech, expressed as your thesis statement. Many speakers pause for a half second, lower their vocal pitch slightly, slow down a little, and deliberately present the thesis statement, the one sentence that encapsulates its purpose. When this is done effectively, the purpose, intent, or main idea of a speech is driven home for an audience.

How to Write a Thesis Statement

Now that we&#;ve looked at why a thesis statement is crucial in a speech, let&#;s switch gears and talk about how we go about writing a solid thesis statement. A thesis statement is related to the general and specific purposes of a speech as we discussed them in Chapter 6 &#;Finding a Purpose and Selecting a Topic&#;.

Choose Your Topic

The first step in writing a good thesis statement was originally discussed in Chapter 6 &#;Finding a Purpose and Selecting a Topic&#; when we discussed how to find topics. Once you have a general topic, you are ready to go to the second step of creating a thesis statement.

Narrow Your Topic

One of the hardest parts of writing a thesis statement is narrowing a speech from a broad topic to one that can be easily covered during a five- to ten-minute speech. While five to ten minutes may sound like a long time to new public speakers, the time flies by very quickly when you are speaking. You can easily run out of time if your topic is too broad. To ascertain if your topic is narrow enough for a specific time frame, ask yourself three questions.

First, is your thesis statement narrow or is it a broad overgeneralization of a topic? An overgeneralization occurs when we classify everyone in a specific group as having a specific characteristic. For example, a speaker&#;s thesis statement that &#;all members of the National Council of La Raza are militant&#; is an overgeneralization of all members of the organization. Furthermore, a speaker would have to correctly demonstrate that all members of the organization are militant for the thesis statement to be proven, which is a very difficult task since the National Council of La Raza consists of millions of Hispanic Americans. A more appropriate thesis related to this topic could be, &#;Since the creation of the National Council of La Raza [NCLR] in , the NCLR has become increasingly militant in addressing the causes of Hispanics in the United States.&#;

The second question to ask yourself when narrowing a topic is whether your speech&#;s topic is one clear topic or multiple topics. A strong thesis statement consists of only a single topic. The following is an example of a thesis statement that contains too many topics: &#;Medical marijuana, prostitution, and gay marriage should all be legalized in the United States.&#; Not only are all three fairly broad, but you also have three completely unrelated topics thrown into a single thesis statement. Instead of a thesis statement that has multiple topics, limit yourself to only one topic. Here&#;s an example of a thesis statement examining only one topic: &#;Today we&#;re going to examine the legalization and regulation of the oldest profession in the state of Nevada.&#; In this case, we&#;re focusing our topic to how one state has handled the legalization and regulation of prostitution.

The last question a speaker should ask when making sure a topic is sufficiently narrow is whether the topic has direction. If your basic topic is too broad, you will never have a solid thesis statement or a coherent speech. For example, if you start off with the topic &#;Barack Obama is a role model for everyone,&#; what do you mean by this statement? Do you think President Obama is a role model because of his dedication to civic service? Do you think he&#;s a role model because he&#;s a good basketball player? Do you think he&#;s a good role model because he&#;s an excellent public speaker? When your topic is too broad, almost anything can become part of the topic. This ultimately leads to a lack of direction and coherence within the speech itself. To make a cleaner topic, a speaker needs to narrow her or his topic to one specific area. For example, you may want to examine why President Obama is a good speaker.

Put Your Topic into a Sentence

Once you&#;ve narrowed your topic to something that is reasonably manageable given the constraints placed on your speech, you can then formalize that topic as a complete sentence. For example, you could turn the topic of President Obama&#;s public speaking skills into the following sentence: &#;Because of his unique sense of lyricism and his well-developed presentational skills, President Barack Obama is a modern symbol of the power of public speaking.&#; Once you have a clear topic sentence, you can start tweaking the thesis statement to help set up the purpose of your speech.

Add Your Argument, Viewpoint, or Opinion

This function only applies if you are giving a speech to persuade. If your topic is informative, your job is to make sure that the thesis statement is nonargumentative and focuses on facts. For example, in the preceding thesis statement we have a couple of opinion-oriented terms that should be avoided for informative speeches: &#;unique sense,&#; &#;well-developed,&#; and &#;power.&#; All three of these terms are laced with an individual&#;s opinion, which is fine for a persuasive speech but not for an informative speech. For informative speeches, the goal of a thesis statement is to explain what the speech will be informing the audience about, not attempting to add the speaker&#;s opinion about the speech&#;s topic. For an informative speech, you could rewrite the thesis statement to read, &#;This speech is going to analyze Barack Obama&#;s use of lyricism in his speech, &#;A World That Stands as One,&#; delivered July in Berlin.&#;

On the other hand, if your topic is persuasive, you want to make sure that your argument, viewpoint, or opinion is clearly indicated within the thesis statement. If you are going to argue that Barack Obama is a great speaker, then you should set up this argument within your thesis statement.

Use the Thesis Checklist

Once you have written a first draft of your thesis statement, you&#;re probably going to end up revising your thesis statement a number of times prior to delivering your actual speech. A thesis statement is something that is constantly tweaked until the speech is given. As your speech develops, often your thesis will need to be rewritten to whatever direction the speech itself has taken. We often start with a speech going in one direction, and find out through our research that we should have gone in a different direction. When you think you finally have a thesis statement that is good to go for your speech, take a second and make sure it adheres to the criteria shown in Table 9.1 &#;Thesis Checklist&#;

Table 9.1 Thesis Checklist

Instructions: For each of the following questions, check either &#;yes&#; or &#;no.&#; Yes No 1. Does your thesis clearly reflect the topic of your speech? 2. Can you adequately cover the topic indicated in your thesis within the time you have for your speech? 3. Is your thesis statement simple? 4. Is your thesis statement direct? 5. Does your thesis statement gain an audience&#;s interest? 6. Is your thesis statement easy to understand? Persuasive Speeches 7. Does your thesis statement introduce a clear argument? 8. Does your thesis statement clearly indicate what your audience should do, how your audience should think, or how your audience should feel? Scoring: For a strong thesis statement, all your answers should have been &#;yes.&#;

Preview of Speech

The final part of an introduction contains a preview of the major points to be covered within your speech. I&#;m sure we&#;ve all seen signs that have three cities listed on them with the mileage to reach each city. This mileage sign is an indication of what is to come. A preview works the same way. A preview foreshadows what the main body points will be in the speech. For example, to preview a speech on bullying in the workplace, one could say, &#;To understand the nature of bullying in the modern workplace, I will first define what workplace bullying is and the types of bullying, I will then discuss the common characteristics of both workplace bullies and their targets, and lastly, I will explore some possible solutions to workplace bullying.&#; In this case, each of the phrases mentioned in the preview would be a single distinct point made in the speech itself. In other words, the first major body point in this speech would examine what workplace bullying is and the types of bullying; the second major body point in this speech would discuss the common characteristics of both workplace bullies and their targets; and lastly, the third body point in this speech would explore some possible solutions to workplace bullying.

Want more information on Y Post with Teeth? Feel free to contact us.

Key Takeaways

  • Linking the attention-getter to the speech topic is essential so that you maintain audience attention and so that the relevance of the attention-getter is clear to your audience.
  • Establishing how your speech topic is relevant and important shows the audience why they should listen to your speech.
  • To be an effective speaker, you should convey all three components of credibility, competence, trustworthiness, and caring/goodwill, by the content and delivery of your introduction.
  • A clear thesis statement is essential to provide structure for a speaker and clarity for an audience.
  • An effective preview identifies the specific main points that will be present in the speech body.

Exercises

  1. Make a list of the attention-getting devices you might use to give a speech on the importance of recycling. Which do you think would be most effective? Why?
  2. Create a thesis statement for a speech related to the topic of collegiate athletics. Make sure that your thesis statement is narrow enough to be adequately covered in a five- to six-minute speech.
  3. Discuss with a partner three possible body points you could utilize for the speech on the topic of volunteerism.
  4. Fill out the introduction worksheet to help work through your introduction for your next speech. Please make sure that you answer all the questions clearly and concisely.