Thesis Statements
Read this section to learn about what a thesis statement is, how to put one together, how it functions in an essay, and get some practice writing thesis statements.
We will talk about the second of the above two tasks of an introduction first. The last sentence of an introduction (called a thesis statement) is a preview of what the essay is about. It transitions readers from the introductory information to the actual body and purpose of the essay. You might find it helpful to think of the thesis statement as a sort of "topic sentence" for multi-paragraph essays. It belongs at the end of your introduction because it is moving readers from your introductory information (which talks around or talks toward your topic, but does not directly address your specific topic and message) into the specific topic and message of the essay.
A thesis statement should contain 3 parts:
- the topic
- what you plan to say about the topic
- a plan of development (how you plan to go about saying what you plan to say – your three or four main ideas)
The first thing I would like you to notice is that the first two parts are very familiar – they are identical to the two parts of a topic sentence!
This just leaves us with the part here that is new: a plan of development. A plan of development is simply a statement of your three or four main ideas. For example, in The Corner Store essay we see the following thesis:
"I feel like I really found the perfect place to work in my current job at The Corner Store where the duties are easy, the people are wonderful, and the pay and benefits are awesome".
Notice that this is not very different from the topic sentence from the paragraph this essay was based upon:
"I really love my job at The Corner Store for many reasons".
The only big difference between this topic sentence and the thesis statement above is that preview of what the reasons are: "the duties are easy, the people are wonderful, and the pay and benefits are awesome".
Another way you might think of a thesis statement is as an "essay map". It is literally a map of what readers should expect to see. Along those lines, please notice that the author of The Corner Store essay has put the main ideas previewed in the thesis statement in the order in which they are discussed in the essay. Make sure when you write a thesis statement to put the ideas in the order in which you will talk about them, so it is easy for readers to follow what you are doing.
Source: Erin Severs
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