This is the first part of a multi-part series on essay writing.

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Your typical essay is split into three distinct sections: the introduction, the body, and the conclusion. For this post, I’m just going to concentrate on writing that introductory paragraph.

So first, what’s the purpose of an introduction? With an introduction, you are trying to grab your reader and get them interested in what you are writing about. Not only that, but you also want to tell the reader exactly what to expect in the rest of the essay. So lets say our essay is going to be about the history of the U.S. Capitol Building in Washington, D.C. (so chosen because I use to lead tours there and already know a lot about it).

General Statement

The first part of our introduction should be a general statement. With the general statement, we are trying to immediately pull the reader into the essay. Usually it’s best to go with one of four methods for the general statement:

  1. A historical review
  2. An anecdote
  3. Statement of fact
  4. Something surprising

Students will usually try for the historical review method and start their essay off with: “Throughout history…” Starting off your essay with those two words is a mistake; it’s cliche and will not grab anyone’s interest. Yet, lets go with the historical review method since our essay is about history.

So lets try: “Located in Washington, D.C., the United States Capitol Building is the seat of the legislative branch of the federal government.” It’s general, interesting, and it begins to pull the reader in.

Thesis Statement

After the general statement, your next step is to move onto your thesis statement. While every English teacher will give you a different definition of a thesis statement, it’s always going to be a statement of what you are going to prove or write about. Your thesis statement is taking your entire essay and summing it up in one sentence.

Our essay is about the history of the U.S. Capitol Building. However, we don’t want to come right out and say “This essay is going to be about the history of…” Remember, we want to keep our reader interested. Write a boring sentence and you’ll lose the reader.

Yet, we also do not want to be general. Saying, “The U.S. Capitol Building has a long and varied history” is better suited for a general statement rather than a thesis statement.

So when coming up with the thesis statement, we should consider the following three elements:

  1. The statement should be strong and specific
  2. The statement should have only one main idea
  3. The statement should tell the reader why they need to read your essay

Keeping that in mind, lets use the following thesis statement: “Because of its importance, the Capitol Building holds a key place in American history and has its own history that is uniquely different than any other building in the United States.” It’s strong, it’s specific, has only one main idea, and tells the reader where they need to read the essay.

Method of Development

After our thesis statement is done, we want to move onto the Method of Development (MoD). Our MoD will give the reader a road-map to our essay. If you noticed, I have an MoD right after the italicized note at the top of this post.

Fortunately enough, the MoD is very easy to come up with. All we need to do is take the supporting ideas of our essay and list them. That’s it.

For a history of the U.S. Capitol Building, our three supporting ideas should be: planning the building, construction of the building, and renovations to the building. Remember, since our thesis statement is about the uniqueness of the Capitol Building, each supporting idea will have to be about why that part is unique. However, we can worry about that when we write our body paragraphs. For now, we just need to state our supporting ideas.

So, our MoD is going to be: “Through its creation to its construction and continuous renovations, there is no other building like the Capitol Building.” Each supporting idea is listed and now our reader knows what the essay will discuss.

All together now!:

Located in Washington, D.C., the United States Capitol Building is the seat of the legislative branch of the federal government. Because of its importance, the Capitol Building holds a key place in American history and has its own history that is uniquely different than any other building in the United States. Through its creation to its construction and continuous renovations, there is no other building like the Capitol Building.

Our introduction is short, captures interest, and tells the reader what the essay is going to be about. Next time, I’ll go over taking our MoD and turning that into the body of an essay.