The introductory paragraph is the first paragraph of the entire essay, and it often consists of two parts: the general statements and the thesis statement.Without an introductory paragraph, your essay seems too abrupt (突兀的) to native speakers of English.However, many writers complain that the most difficult part of writing an essay is getting started.How many times have you wasted valuable minutes when you are trying hard to think of the first sentence? In fact, getting started, or writing a fairly good introductory paragraph is not a tough job if you have an insight into the following:
1.The General Statements.
2.Brainstorming and Effective Division of Ideas.
3.The Thesis Statement and its Characteristics.
Although the introductory paragraph should be written from the general statements to the thesis statement, you will find it easier to learn to write this paragraph in a reverse order.
1.The Thesis Statement and its Characteristics
The thesis statement is a sentence (or sentences) in which the main idea of an essay is stated.In other words, after reading your thesis statement, a reader will be able to get a clear picture of what you are trying to accomplish.A good thesis statement has the following characteristics:
1) It is a straightforward statement；therefore, there is no room for suspen-se or surprises.
2) It has two parts: the topic and the controlling idea.The topic refers to what the essay is about；the controlling idea is the writer's opinion or attitude from which the reader can ask questions about: How? Why? In what ways? What are they? etc..
3) It is the most specific sentence in the introductory paragraph.
4) It is usually the last sentence of the introductory paragraph.
5) There are basically two types of thesis statements: implied and stated.An implied thesis statement means that the main points are not stated；a stated thesis statement indicates that the main points are clearly stated.For example:
Implied: Computers are very popular with people today for many reasons.
Stated: Computers are very popular with people today because they are patient, fast, and reliable.
The three underlined words in the stated thesis statement are actually the three main points that will be specifically discussed in the body paragraphs；that is, the essay will focus on computers' patience, speed, and reliability.Note: if you write a stated thesis statement, the main points in it should be grammatically parallel.
Practice 4-2-1
In each of the following clearly stated thesis statements, identify the topic and underline the main points.For example:
Authentic Chinese dishes are typically prized for its combination of color, aroma (香味) , and taste.
The topic: authentic Chinese dishes
The main points: color, aroma, and taste.
Answers are provided only for the first five sentences.
1.Excellence, friendship and respect are the fundamental Olympic values. (IOC president Jacques Rogge)
2.In a quickly changing world, the most important part of education is to learn how to think critically, how to create and how to ask interesting questions.
3.The three basic causes of the U.S.Civil War lay in the economic superiority of the northern states, the slavery issue, and the political question of the right of individual states to secede from the United States and form a separate country.
4.Wars in the twentieth century were fought for three major reasons: ethnic, economic, and religious.
5.The Olympic spirit aims for“higher, faster and stronger”.
6.Losing weight gives me self-confidence socially, emotionally, and professionally.
7.I'm attending college to gain knowledge, to meet people, and to prepare for a good job.
8.My plans are as follows: get my degree, find a good job, and have a family.
9.Greenpeace (国际绿色和平组织) has had steady, if small, successes in decreasing whale hunting, saving old forests, and cutting down on the toxic pollution of our air and water.
10.The most important values I have learned from my parents are the importance of family support, of hard work, and of a good education.
11.John hoped that his book would be published, that it would become a best seller, and that it would be made into a movie.
12.The main advantages of urban planning are that we can control a city's appearance, effectively organize transportation, and make sure there is enough open space.
13.Some college graduates attend law school because they hope to get high-paying jobs, because they are not yet ready to work, and because they are not sure what else to do.
14.Snakes can be classified into three categories according to the way they kill and eat their preys: those that swallow the prey live, those that inject poison into the prey, and those that squeeze the prey to death.
15.With two people working together, tasks tend to be completed more quickly, a wider range of skills is brought to the job, and most importantly, production is increased.
Practice 4-2-2
Correct the faulty parallelism in each of the following thesis statements.Change the wording as necessary.Answers are provided only as suggestions.
1.She is elegant, intelligence, and attractive.
2.The most expensive items in this company's budget are employee salaries, communication costs, and supplies that are used in the office.
3.We asked the store manager to show us a gift that was not expensive, but useful and looked nice.
4.Plenty of students without financial resources can still go to college because they can borrow money from banks, hold part-time jobs, and scholarships are available.
5.Failure in university is frequently attributed to a lack of responsibility, discipline, and not knowing basic study skills.
6.The game-show contestant was told to be cheerful, charming, and with enthusiasm.
7.City living is exciting, convenient, and provides plenty of entertainment.
8.What do the super-rich know about disease, those who are hungry, and poverty?
9.Nutritionists use three methods to decide if a person has malnutrition: physical exams, laboratory tests, and study his usual diet.
10.Newcomers to Canada who come from warm climates with no snow often find themselves depressed by the drizzly autumns, freezing winters, and without spring at all.
Practice 4-2-3
Correct the faulty parallelism in each of the following thesis statements.Change the wording as necessary.No answers are provided.
1.Organization, expression, and revising are three keys to good writing.
2.Adam convinced most of the audience because he argued logically, calmly, and was reasonable.
3.Working with children is interesting, challenging, and has its rewards.
4.Nuclear power is a safe, renewable, and not expensive source of energy.
5.If we're not careful, we'll leave the next generation polluted air, contaminated water, and forests that are dying.
6. While waiting for the exam to start, small groups of nervous students glanced over their notes, drank coffee, and were whispering to each other.
7.Air China aims at safety, being on time, and good service.
8.Climbing frozen waterfalls requires strength, knowledge of the proper tools, and it is very important to have clothes that keep you warm, too.
9.Political candidates can be grouped by age, gender, and whether people like them or not.
10.We are constantly bombarded with messages in the form of oral communication, written communication, and what we see.
2.Brainstorming and Effective Division of Ideas
Brainstorming is a process of writing down as many ideas as you have about your topic as quickly as you can.In this process, there is no formal organization；therefore, you can forget about logical order, grammar, or even spelling errors for the time being.Instead, just jot down your random thoughts in words, phrases, and/or sentences.Only after you have finished brainstorming will you go back and select and organize your material.Brainstorming can be an important part of essay writing both because it permits you to see immediately how much you know about a topic and because it helps you write the thesis statement and the body paragraphs of your essay.Keep brainstorming until you have exhausted all possibilities that are directly related to your topic.Do not worry about jotting down too much on paper because it's easier to cross out the ideas that you do not need than it is to try hard to think of new ideas for an essay.
The following example shows how brainstorming helps to generate ideas about the general topic“jogging”.
—good for lungs and heart
—cheap equipment
—healthy
—poor shoes won't last
—good appetite
—races
—jogging paths vs.street
—fresh air
—marathons
—both men ＆ women
—run with friends
—sweat
—jog all year round
—out of breath
—relax
—forget your troubles
—lose weight
—fun
—good for any age group
—no competition
—shoes
—warm up before jog
—cool down after jog
—sports
If the general topic is narrowed to a new topic“jogging improves people's health”, you can leave in (保留) the relevant ideas that prove or support this new topic, and cross out the unrelated ideas.
Practice 4-2-4
Choose one of the general topics below, and keep writing down whatever comes to your mind until you run out of ideas.Answers will vary.
1.a CEO
2.natural disasters
3.the Olympic Games
4.fast food
5.Chinese New Year
6.tourist attractions
7.public figures
8.social welfare
9.the United Nations (UN)
10.traffic jams
11.financial crisis
12.generation gap
13.Nobel Prize
14.Valentine's Day
15.graduation ceremony
After brainstorming, you have gathered plenty of ideas, but they may be in random order.The next step that you should follow is to first go over these ideas to determine those that are most closely related, and then divide all these related ideas into a number of logical groups.The ability to divide ideas into logical groups is extremely important both as a way to write the thesis statement of an essay and as a way to organize the body paragraphs of the essay.To divide ideas into logical groups, you must judge whether things that seem unrelated may have something in common.
The following, gathered from brainstorming, are some of the reasons why college graduates have difficulty finding a satisfying job in China.
—Some colleges and universities fail to offer the courses that can meet the needs of the society.
—Short of work experience, some graduates may have a slim chance of getting hired.
—Some students are just too demanding.
—An increasing number of overseas students are hunting for jobs back in China.
—Most students choose popular majors rather than rarefied fields；as a result, there is an oversupply of graduates in certain specialties.
—Some students don't work hard enough to prepare themselves for their future career.
—The low employment rate is attributed to the global financial crisis.
—The expansion of enrollment in colleges and universities all over China accounts for the stiff competition in job markets.
—Some students don't know how to write a flawless résumé.
—Unable to stand the poor pay, some graduates opt to give up the job offer.
From the list above, you can notice that some reasons are international, some are domestic, and some are personal.As a result, the ideas in the list can be roughly divided into three groups:
Group 1.international:
—The low employment rate is attributed to the global financial crisis.
—An increasing number of overseas students are hunting for jobs back in China.
Group 2.domestic:
—The expansion of enrollment in colleges and universities all over China accounts for the stiff competition in job markets.
—Some colleges and universities fail to offer the courses that can meet the needs of the society.
Group 3.personal:
—Most students choose popular majors rather than rarefied fields；as a result, there is an oversupply of graduates in certain specialties.
—Short of work experience, some graduates may have a slim chance of getting hired.
—Unable to stand the poor pay, some graduates opt to give up the job offer.
—Some students don't work hard enough to prepare themselves for their future career.
—Some students are just too demanding.
—Some students don't know how to write a flawless résumé.
The following is a good thesis statement based upon the effective division of ideas about the difficulty that college graduates have when looking for a satisfying job in China:
College graduates have difficulty finding a satisfying job in China due to three major reasons: international, domestic, and personal.
* * * * * *
It's obvious that before you write the thesis statement of an essay and the body paragraphs of the essay, you should learn how to divide ideas into logical groups effectively.The three basic rules that you should keep in mind are that in a good division, the categories must be distinct, balanced, and limited.
First, the random thoughts that you have gathered from brainstorming must be truly put into meaningful groups.You should not, for example, divide the news about entertainment and the news about movies into two different groups because movies are actually included in the entertainment category.The division is indistinct. (See Figure 1.below)
Second, a good division is one that divides ideas into equally balanced groups.You should not say that there are two types of news: news about entertainment, and news about other topics.One category contains only one topic, but the other may contain over one hundred.One is too specific, and the other is too general.The division is imbalanced. (See Figure 2.below)
Third, it is better to divide ideas into a few general groups rather than into many specific ones.For instance, there will be too many categories if all pieces of news are divided according to their subject matters: entertainment, tourism, medicine, science, business, industry, agriculture, education, sports, etc..The division is not limited. (See Figure 3.below)
Figure 1 Indistinct
Figure 2 Imbalanced
Figure 3 Limitless
In a good division the categories will be distinct, balanced, and limited. (See Figure 4.below)
Figure 4 Good
Practice 4-2-5
There are three essay topics below.
Topic one: Discuss three major reasons that lead to a student's failure to pass an exam.
Topic two: Discuss three major pressures that college students are facing in modern-day China.
Topic three: Discuss three major pressures that employees are bearing in modern-day China.
Choose one of the essay topics and complete the following tasks.
Step 1.Brainstorm to gather as many ideas as you can about your chosen essay topic.
Step 2.Divide all your ideas into three general groups and cross out the ideas that do not fit any of the groups.
Step 3.Write an appropriate thesis statement for this essay topic.Keep in mind that the three main points in the thesis statement must be grammatically parallel.
Answers are provided only for the first topic as suggestions.
3.The General Statements
The general statements are the background information about the topic of the essay, and they are usually broad and provide information already known to the reader.The purpose of the general statements is to interest your reader in your topic, and lead smoothly to your thesis statement which is new to your reader.The number of general statements you write in the introductory paragraph will depend on how long your whole essay is.However, you are expected to write at least two or three general statements in this part.The first sentence should be a very general comment about the topic.The second sentence should be less general, and so on.
After the last general statement, you can write the thesis statement which is usually the last sentence of the introductory paragraph.So far, the first paragraph of an essay-the introductory paragraph-is completed.
When writing the introductory paragraph, keep in mind:
1) Although the general statements usually refer to some general information, they must be naturally relevant to the topic of the essay, too.
2) The general statements and the thesis statement should be smoothly connected.Any awkward jump in thought between these two parts should be avoided.
* * * * * *
Read the following two introductory paragraphs.Note: The first one has a stated thesis statement, and the second has an implied thesis statement.
Introductory paragraph one:
In the last fifteen or twenty years, computers have begun to influence almost every area of modern life.We are quite accustomed to seeing computers in the workplace, in stores, and in schools and universities.It is not surprising that computers and computerized robots may some day make our home life easier and more interesting.In the home, computers will do unpleasant chores, maintain a comfortable environment, and make available great amounts of information.
Introductory paragraph two:
When you walk downtown in almost any large American city, you can see some homeless people.They sit on the streets with their shopping carts full of their meager (破烂的) belongings and often ask for money.Do they make you nervous? Do they even scare you? The truth is that most homeless people do not want to be homeless, and they are afraid of the same things that you are.So, homeless people, like everyone else, need basically three things to feel safe in their environment.
Both of the introductory paragraphs above are well-written because the sentences in each paragraph are all relevant to the topic, and each thought moves smoothly from general statements to the specific thesis statement.After reading the two introductory paragraphs, the reader can get a clear idea of what will be discussed in each of the essays.
As you can see, the thesis statement and the topic sentence have different functions: the thesis statement presents the topic of the essay as a whole；the topic sentence states the topic of a single paragraph.
To sum up, the introductory paragraph is like an upside-down triangle: wide at the top (beginning) , gradually narrow in the middle, and very small at the bottom (end).
Practice 4-2-6
Read the following introductory paragraphs, in each of which the sentences are in incorrect order.Rearrange each paragraph, beginning with the most general statement first.Then add each sentence in correct order from the next most general to the least general.Finally, put the thesis statement last.Answers are provided.
Introductory paragraph one:
(1) Therefore, workaholics' lifestyles can affect their families, social lives, and health. (2) In addition, those who are called workaholics may not spend enough time in leisure activities. (3) Nowadays, many men and women work in law, accounting, real estate, and business. (4) These people are serious about becoming successful；they work long hours during the week and even on weekends, so they are called“workaholics”.
Introductory paragraph two:
(1) We hear a lot about the negative effects of television on the viewer. (2) It would be just as harmful to listen to music or to eat constantly. (3) Obviously, television can be harmful if it is watched constantly to the exclusion of other activities. (4) However, when television is watched in moderation, it is extremely valuable, as it provides relaxation, entertainment, and education.
Introductory paragraph three:
(1) Microwave ovens are now found in homes, in business offices, and even in camps. (2) Most people would agree that this invention, with its many advantages, has made our busy lives much easier. (3) Engineers and inventors continually design new products that affect our everyday lives. (4) Indeed, they are everywhere. (5) One product that was developed and has become popular in the last few decades is the microwave oven.
Practice 4-2-7
Read the following introductory paragraphs, in each of which the sentences are in incorrect order.Rearrange each paragraph, beginning with the most general statement first.Then add each sentence in correct order from the next most general to the least general.Finally, put the thesis statement last.No answers are provided.
Introductory paragraph one:
(1) But, despite these differences, there are some general ways a young man in Canada meets, dates, and marries a young woman. (2) But the actual process is little more complicated and varies considerably from individual to individual, partly because of cultural differences between the young of Canada, a nation built on immigrants. (3) Canadian children tease each other with the rhyme, “First comes love, then comes marriage, then comes Ken pushing a baby carriage.”
Introductory paragraph two:
(1) To find out, I conducted a survey. (2) After looking over their answers, I realized that there are three types of students in my class: the“Don't know”type, the“Go Back Home”type, and the“Stay Abroad”type. (3) Will they return to their own countries or stay abroad? (4) Where will my classmates be next year after they graduate? (5) I asked each of them what he or she plans to do after graduation.
Introductory paragraph three:
(1) Actually, rushing to help a blind person without asking if that person needs help and speaking loudly are just two of the inappropriate ways we react to blind people. (2) When we see a blind person nearing a street corner, we may try to help by taking that person's arm and guiding him or her across the street, and while we do that, some of us talk to the blind person in a loud voice, as if the blind person is not only helpless but also deaf. (3) If we want to help a blind person whom we perceive as in need of help, we should bear in mind the following tips.
Practice 4-2-8
Choose one of the thesis statements below, and add general statements to it.For example:
The thesis statement:
The three major problems of overpopulation that many Chinese are suffering from in daily life are housing shortage, serious traffic jams, and social insecurity.
General statements added to the thesis statement:
Many of us used to take pride in our country's large population, regarding it as resources of manpower.But now, when it comes to the population in our country again, we do find our previous idea naive and immature.Today, we realize that the large population has more drawbacks than benefits.The three major problems of overpopulation that many Chinese are suffering from in daily life are housing shortage, serious traffic jams, and social insecurity.
Answers will vary.
1.Reasons for the popularity of cars in China include the increased purchasing power, mobility, and status symbol.
2.To choose a major, a student has to consider three factors: personal interest, availability of training institutions, and job opportunities.
3.As individuals, we find computers useful in the areas of entertainment, education, and business.
Practice 4-2-9
Choose one of the essay topics given in Practice 4-2-5, and then complete the following tasks.
Step 1.Write an appropriate introductory paragraph for your chosen essay topic.
Step 2.Check your introductory paragraph against the Introductory Paragraph Checklist below.
Answers are provided only for the first topic as suggestions.
Introductory Paragraph Checklist
1.Does the introductory paragraph consist of two parts: the general statements and the thesis statement?
2.Do the general statements give background information on the topic and gradually lead the reader into the most specific information-the thesis statement?
3.Are the general statements and the thesis statement smoothly connected?
4.If you write a stated thesis statement, are the main points in it grammatically parallel?