Your thesis statement is an important part of your essay, so you need to make sure that it is clear and is properly formatted. Although the exact preferences and requirements may vary slightly from one college to the next, the format is fairly universal. Here are some tips for properly formatting your thesis statement.
What Is a Thesis Statement?
A thesis statement is essentially just a couple of sentences within your essay or text which describes the main focus of the essay and lets readers know what the essay is actually about. The thesis statement will usually appear right at the end of your introduction. It seems pretty simple, but it is perhaps the most important element of your essay so it is important to get it exactly right.
Creating Your Thesis Statement
As mentioned briefly above, your thesis statement is usually the last couple of sentences of your introduction paragraph. The aim is to unify all of the concepts that your paper covers and provide a direction for your argument.
Making Your Point
Start off by writing down your main point. You need to answer all of the questions in your assignment and you need to be specific and focused. Many students find the best way to tackle writing a thesis statement is to treat it like an equation. That equation looks a little something like this:
Your Argument + How You Plan On Proving Your Argument = Your Thesis Statement
Testing Your Thesis
Once you have come up with your thesis statement you need to test it out. Read over your thesis statement and maybe ask a few friends to do so as well. If the thesis statement leaves room for someone to ask how? Or why? , then you are going to need to re-evaluate it in order to make sure it answers these questions.
Let’s look at an example:
When you are making your point you write down ‘video games’ as your topic. However, this is far to vague, so you develop that into your argument and it becomes ‘Society objects to violent video games’. Now you are going to have to test that statement. You will see that it does not answer all of the questions that people might have such as why do people object and what video games. Upon re-evaluating the thesis statement you might alter it to become ‘Society believes that violent video games such as GTAV cause teens to be more aggressive in response to graphic violence, a lack of censorship and adult themes.’ This is better because it is more specific and it indicates the areas that you will examine.
Does Your Essay Support Your Thesis
On occasion, when you complete your essay you might realise that you did not do what your thesis said you would and it is no longer valid. That’s okay, you can adjust your thesis statement to fit the direction that your work ended up taking.
Hopefully these tips will help you to format your thesis statement appropriately. Do keep in mind that these are only general guidelines and you should check with your college’s house style in case there are any specific requirements that they ask for.