Introduce your subject in the first paragraph of your paper.
Try
to draw the attention of your
reader by making a broad
statement about your main
idea.
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Your introduction should be
natural without being too informal;
and it should be informative without
being obscure.
Ensure
that your introduction is not
be general.
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Stick to the subject rather than discussing something in
the world at large unless it is absolutely essential to your
topic. A generalized introduction
will give the impression that you have no clear focus for
your paper.
To avoid being too general, make
sure that you state the keywords of
your subject in the first sentence of
your paper.
Examples:
Introductory
sentence too broad:
- Computers are important for
learning.
Revised:
- Advances in software,
processing power, and
Internet access, have made
computers powerful and
effective tools in the
learning process.
The next few sentences should
proceed from
general to specific
gradually moving closer and closer to
your main idea, finally
leading to a thesis statement.
These sentences should provide a
background to your subject and must
be related to the topics you are
going to discuss in the body
paragraphs of your paper.
The most important part
of the introduction is the thesis statement,
because this tells the reader what your paper is about. The
thesis sentence is usually, but not always, the last sentence
in the introductory paragraph. It should clearly state the
purpose and focus of your paper without resorting to stiff,
mechanical formulas such as "In
this essay, I will discuss..."
The
length of an introduction is also
important. In a
short essay, an introduction should
consist of four or five sentences. If
it is shorter, the essay will look
rushed or underdeveloped; if it is
longer, the reader will be bored. A
very long essay or thesis may have an
introduction consisting of two
paragraphs, or even a whole page, but
a short essay should have only a
one-paragraph introduction.
If you face a writer's block while
trying to write your introduction,
try to make a rough draft of your
ideas and proceed to the body
paragraphs. Come back to the
introductory paragraph when you have
finished the rest of the essay.
It's
a good idea to write a draft
introduction first and then revise it
once you have finished writing your
paper.
Next to Thesis Statements
Back to Sample Outlines
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