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5 Tips for Teaching How to Write A Thesis Statement

The first time I had students write a thesis, I assumed they knew how to do it. After all, I learned all about the five-paragraph essay myself in middle school in the same school district. To my disappointment, not a single student knew how to write an adequate thesis statement. I realized it was a skill I was going to have to teach myself. After several papers and many years, here are my tips for teaching how to write a thesis statement. 

Tips for Teaching How to Write a Thesis Statement #1: Teach Directly

You need a whole lesson around the thesis statement. 

It can be ten minutes or a whole class period with note-taking and an activity. 

But you have to spend some time directly teaching the thesis statement. You can’t expect students–even seniors in high school–to know what a thesis statement is, its purpose, or where it’s supposed to go. 

If you’re teaching an essay writing unit, go ahead and explain the whole essay structure. But make sure you plan some time to specifically touch on the thesis statement and its role. 

Don’t have a thesis-specific lesson? Check out my five-paragraph essay mini-lessons here , which include some thesis-specific slides. 

Tips for Teaching How to Write a Thesis Statement #2: Explain The Role of a Thesis

I think it’s easy for students to grasp the concept of a thesis. It states what the essay is going to be about. They can get that.

But I think it’s much harder for students to understand how the thesis also guides and outlines the rest of the essay.  

By the time they’re writing the conclusion statements for their body paragraphs, they’ve forgotten their own thesis and rarely reference it. Instead of letting their thesis dictate the topic of their body paragraphs, they get stuck trying to come up with something new.

Don’t just tell students what a thesis is. Spend some time showing them how the thesis continues to be referenced in every following paragraph. Show them how the ideas presented in their thesis statement will guide the following paragraphs. 

Not sure how? This Unscramble the 5-Paragraph Essay Activity is a great start . Students will have to put the sentences in an essay in order, which can lead to some great discussions about how a strong thesis statement adds clarity to the rest of the essay’s structure.

Tips for Teaching How to Write a Thesis Statement #3: Give Students A Framework 

If your students are struggling with writing strong thesis statements, give them a framework. 

I know as teachers, it can get really boring to read “W is true because X, Y, Z.” But the structure does work, and it’s a great place for struggling writers to start. 

If you’ve used other writing frameworks in class (such as claim, evidence, and reasoning or C-E-R ), your students will be familiar with having a structure for their writing. They’ll be familiar with the concept already and a lot more confident producing their own thesis statements. 

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Tips for Teaching How to Write a Thesis Statement #4: Provide Lots of Examples

As with teaching all new skills, you can never have enough examples. 

If your students are writing essays, provide them with examples for the topic they’re covering. But also provide lots of examples for other essay topics.

Give them examples that are both strong and weak, and let them discuss why each is which. 

Let them peer-edit one another’s thesis statements. 

You can do this in a note-taking style lesson, sit and get discussions, or, my personal favorite, a gallery walk. 

If this last idea is interesting to you, check out my Writing Strong Thesis Statements Activity . You’ll place examples of both strong and weak thesis statements around the room. Then, students will have to walk around the room, identifying which statements are strong and which are weak. It’s a great jumping off point for deeper discussions around effective theses. 

Tips for Teaching How to Write a Thesis Statement #5: Give Sentence Starters for More Scaffolding

If your students are still struggling, give them sentence starters. 

Provide students with the thesis statement itself. Leave a blank for their overall argument and their three supporting reasons (if that’s the structure you expect from them). 

Even if your students do alright with writing thesis statements, it might be nice to offer a variety of sentence starters to encourage them to try a new structure for their thesis. 

Bonus Tip: Teach the Plural Form

This is a little silly, but I thought I would add it. Teach students that the plural of “thesis” is “theses.”

Every time I use the word “theses” in my classroom, students are tickled by it. I’m not sure why they find the plural version so odd, but it’s an interesting tidbit you can casually share with your students during one of your essay-writing lessons.

Like all good teaching, taking it slow and offering multiple forms of scaffolding is the key to teaching how to write a thesis statement. 

If you’re looking for thesis or general essay-writing resources, check out my 5-Paragraph Essay Writing Resources Bundle!

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Why Thesis Statements Are Important for Kids

Should you teach thesis statements? If so, in what grade should you teach thesis statements? Hey, are thesis statements even important?

Most people don’t really understand what a thesis statement is, and even the people who do understand what a thesis statement is don’t really understand why it is important. Until a few years ago, I didn’t really get them. I didn’t think they were important. I always thought a thesis statement was just a word that English majors liked to use.

When getting my teaching credential I did get straight A’s, and I can honestly say that I never once thought about the term thesis statement . When getting my undergraduate degree, getting good grades was just one of my many interests, so I am quite sure that I cared even less about thesis statements back then. Don’t worry—I did just fine. So, how important are thesis statements if all of this is possible? Do thesis statements really help create good writing? Are thesis statements really an essential element of good writing?

Do We Really Need to Teach Thesis Statements in Elementary School and Middle School?

The California State Writing Standards for 5th grade states this:

Grade 5 Writing Strategies 1.0 – Students write clear, coherent, and focused essays.

Technically, and by definition, an essay has a thesis statement. Okay, so thesis statements may be important. However, when elementary and middle school students are struggling with paragraphs and grammar, thesis statements can SEEM quite unimportant.

In fact, when one considers Piaget’s constructivist learning theory , thesis statements can seem like a waste of time for students who still struggle with a variety of simple writing concepts. Do you want to spend valuable class time teaching students concepts that may not help them just yet? And surely you don’t want students to become so overwhelmed with writing that they think, “Okay, I admit it—I don’t understand writing… and I never will.” Thesis statements can have that effect. So should you or shouldn’t you teach them?

THESIS THINKING: The Real Reason Thesis Statements are Important

What I have now come to see is that you can use thesis statements as a tool for achieving many different writing and reading comprehension results.

Thesis statements have become a coat rack on which I hang many concepts. I’ve come to the conclusion that the most important thing about thesis statements is the THESIS THINKING that goes along with them.

John Truby, a screenwriting teacher, had this to say about story premises. The way he uses the term premise is what I have learned to teach my students about thesis statements.

The very first step in creating a good script is to figure out a great premise. Your premise is your story stated in a single line. It’s probably the most important element in any script, because if it’s not a good premise, there is very little that you can do to make the overall script work—make the overall script something that people will want to read. So it’s very important that you start with a good core idea. –– John Truby –– Screenwriting Teacher

Thesis is very closely related to premise. Let’s substitute thesis for premise and essay for script and see how it reads.

The very first step in creating a good essay is to figure out a great thesis. Your thesis is your essay stated in a single line. It’s probably the most important element in any essay, because if it’s not a good thesis, there is very little that you can do to make the overall essay work—make the overall essay something that people will want to read. So it’s very important that you start with a good core idea.

Put simply, THESIS THINKING is important in all kinds of writing. THESIS THINKING also helps with reading comprehension. In fact, thesis statements and THESIS THINKING help students in all these areas:

•     Write powerful topic sentences that put forth important main ideas. •     Find main ideas in text. •     Write whole compositions with a purpose. •     Master the different modes of writing. •     Summarize a text. •     Narrow or broaden a topic. •     Develop clear and concise thinking and clear and concise writing. •     Understand the purpose behind each of the different types of essays. •     Write and read stories that contain a larger meaning and that communicate a larger message—i.e., stories that have a premise. •     And many more!

Back to Piaget—Do Students Really Need to Understand Thesis Statements?

Beginning writers and struggling writers do need to understand thesis statements. However, they are not going to really understand them until they master a variety of foundational skills—skills that will make the concept of thesis statements have real meaning. Piaget certainly would not approve of demanding that students include thesis statements when students don’t understand the following basic concepts and when students don’t possess the following foundational writing skills:

Writing Foundation A: Students must understand and internalize two levels of beginning, middle, and ending:

1.     Beginning, middle, and ending in paragraphs. 2.     Beginning, middle, and ending in whole compositions.

Writing Foundation B: Students must be able to write basic whole compositions (essays, reports, narratives etc.) quickly and easily. They must own a method for breaking down writing topics and writing prompts and for organizing their thoughts. They must have a method for getting to work and finishing their work.

Writing Foundation C: Students must be in complete control over the paragraph and how paragraphs connect together within an essay. Students must also to be in complete control over the relationship that paragraphs have with the introduction and conclusion.

Parts to Whole: Create a True Foundation for Thesis Statements

As discussed before, thesis statements are, in one sense, the entire essay stated in a single sentence. The thesis statement represents the whole .

Unfortunately, students are taught parts—parts, parts, parts.  Students learn that they must be able to write just one good sentence—then just one good paragraph. Then all of a sudden, completely out of the blue, some teacher jumps to the top-down approach. This teacher starts with the whole—i.e., thesis statements.

Students learn parts—and then students learn wholes. But they never have the entire process constructed for them in a way that makes sense. Pattern Based Writing: Quick & Easy Essay is the foundation that makes sense. You will create Writing Foundation A, B, and C, all of them, quickly and easily.

One homeschooling parent had this to say when she found the Pattern Based Writing: Quick & Easy Essay program:

A kind lady on this board put me on the trail of a writing program that I downloaded last night and I think it is revolutionary – I finally ‘get’ it.

A 7th grade teacher had this to say:

I was describing it to a colleague a little while ago as, ‘the basics made clearer.’  I have taught many of these ideas but not as an organized structure. I had no formal way of getting the ideas to be part of my students’ natural writing process. Thank you for this opportunity to enjoy teaching my students writing.

Pattern Based Writing: Quick & Easy Essay is the only writing program I know of that is truly constructivist parts-to-whole essay teaching. That’s why it works! That’s why it makes sense to students, parents, and teachers! If you teach elementary school, or if you have a few struggling middle school writers, be sure to take a serious look at the program on the homepage!

The fastest, most effective way to teach clear, organized paragraph and multi-paragraph writing… Guaranteed!

Create academic or professional success today by improving your critical thinking, logical arguments, and effective communication.

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Activities to Teach How to Write A Thesis Statement

Research Writing , Secondary Literacy , Writing

If there’s any literacy skill you would want your English Language Arts students to master, it would probably be how to write a thesis statement . If you want to teach your students how to write powerful, eloquent, and exceptionally captivating thesis statements, then you’ll love the activities in this article.

The key to any good essay is a strong thesis statement. A strong thesis statement sets the tone and clarifies the author’s purpose : it tells you the writer’s opinion, along with the level of thought and criticism that has gone into formulating it.

A strong thesis statement also creates an alluring introduction paragraph. This makes each paper in your grading pile a lot more inviting.

How do you teach students to write a thesis statement to make their audience continue reading? This blog post explores six activities to teach how to write a thesis statement.

1. Differentiate Between Strong and Weak Thesis Statements

Writing a thesis statement might be a new skill for your students. Thesis statements are often taught as a topic sentence or the “whole essay boiled down into one sentence.” This can be a challenging concept for your students to grasp.

To teach how to write a thesis statement, have a discussion about what makes a strong thesis statement. You can turn this into a collaborative lesson by brainstorming clarifying statements ; these statements dictate what a thesis is and is not.

For example: “ A proper thesis statement is written in one sentence ,” or “ a proper thesis statement is directly related to the rest of the essay .” This is a great opportunity to teach students the difference between concepts like a “topic sentence” or a “hook.”

Your students can use this free bookmark to differentiate between a strong thesis statement and a weak one. This slideshow lesson also explores clarifying statements with detailed examples.

2. Evaluate Thesis Statement Examples

Now that students have plenty of guidelines, challenge their understanding by evaluating thesis statement examples . You can use thesis statement examples from past students’ essays. You can even write your own examples based on the clarifying statements you create with your class.

If you’re open to your students receiving constructive, anonymous criticism , you can even have them write a thesis statement and evaluate each one as a class. I’ve had success with providing students with a thesis statement topic and having them write a thesis statement. Then, I prompt them to swap with their elbow partner to offer feedback.

If you’d rather provide a comprehensive list of thesis statements that reflect the common errors you would typically see in students’ essays, there are several student examples in this introductory lesson on how to write a thesis statement – this is one of my favourite activities for teaching thesis statement writing!

3. Provide a Thesis Statement Template

One of the easiest ways to teach how to write a thesis statement is to offer a thesis statement template . There are a variety of thesis statement templates that students can use as a framework for their essays. I start with a basic template that involves the three parts of a thesis statement: a topic, position, and evidence . I then demonstrate to students how they can create variations of this template, depending on which order they introduce each part. You can find examples for each template in these thesis statement handouts .

You can also introduce a few sentence styles to your students. These styles scaffold eloquent thesis statements. They also offer students the space to articulate their thoughts without exceeding the one-sentence limit.

Sentence Styles for the Three Parts of a Thesis Statement

Here are a few sentence styles that incorporate the three parts of a thesis statement. Each style also includes an example written by a real student:

• Style A : “Noun phrase; Noun phrase; Noun phrase – Independent Clause” Example: “The promotion of hygiene; the presence of medical professionals; the prevention of death – these are all reasons why supervised injection services are an important facet of public health.”
• Style B : If (subject + verb + object phrase), if (subject + verb + object phrase ), if (subject + verb + object phrase ), then (independent clause) Example: “If taxpayers do not wish to have their money allocated to cruelty, if more than 100 million animals die from animal testing a year, if alternatives to animal testing exist, then governments should ban the practice of testing on animals.”
• Style C : Independent clause: subject + verb, subject + verb, subject + verb Example: “College education should be entirely funded by the government: student debt would be eliminated, education would not be commodified, and access to education would not be exclusive to privileged people.”

All of these sentence styles are outlined in these practice worksheets for how to write a thesis statement, with writing prompts to reinforce each thesis statement template through repeated practice.

4. Daily Practice Activities to Teach How to Write a Thesis Statement

One of the most effective ways to teach how to write a thesis statement is through repeated practice. You can do this by incorporating daily bell ringers into your persuasive writing unit. To assign this activity, I provide students with three topics to choose from. I then prompt them to develop an opinion and write a thesis statement for one.

I’ll also include bell ringers that provide a thesis statement that students need to evaluate. Students really enjoy these drills! They get the opportunity to develop opinions on interesting topics, and many of them choose to explore these ideas as the subject of their final research paper.

If you’re looking for pre-made worksheets with thesis statement activities, these daily thesis statement bell ringers include one month’s worth of thesis statement prompts, graphic organizers, and templates in both digital and ready-to-print format.

5. Use a Self-Assessment Thesis Statement Anchor Chart

You can provide students with a thesis statement anchor chart to reference the guidelines and rules they’ve learned. A personalized anchor chart is best – like this free thesis statement bookmark – so that students can have it on hand while they are reading and writing.

You can distribute the anchor chart at the beginning of your research paper unit. Students can refer to it while evaluating thesis statement examples or completing daily practice activities. A thesis statement anchor chart has been a complete game-changer in my classroom, and I’m pleased to learn that many of my students have held on to these after completing my course.

6. Provide Engaging Thesis Statement Topics

You can collaborate with your students to generate an engaging list of good topics for thesis statements. Start by writing down every topic that your students suggest. Then, you can narrow this list down to avoid broad, far-reaching thesis statements that lead to a watered-down essay. When I make this list with my students, we end up with topics that are truly engaging for them. I also have the opportunity to clarify which topics might be a little too vague or broad for an exceptional essay.

For example, students often suggest topics like “racism” or “the problem with school.” These are learning opportunities to demonstrate to students that a great thesis statement is the essential starting point for an even greater essay.

To elaborate, a topic like racism has different implications all over the world. It is far too complex to explore in a single, 750-word essay. Instead, we work together to narrow this topic down to something like “racism in the media,” or even better, “representation in Hollywood.”

Additionally, a topic like “the problem with school” is more of a conclusion. To solve this, we work backward to identify some of the aspects of our school that make it an obstacle . This can include uniforms, early starts, or cell phone policies. This process leads students to a more concise topic, like “cell phone policies in twenty-first-century schools.”

If you’re looking for engaging thesis statement topics to inspire your students, I’ve included a list of 75 argumentative essay topics in this practice unit for how to write a thesis statement .

Tying it All Together

There are plenty of fun thesis statement activities and practice lessons that you can incorporate into your curriculum. Give thesis statements the love and attention they deserve in the classroom – after all, they truly are the most important part of a research essay.

All of the worksheets, lessons, and activities explored in this blog post are included in Mondays Made Easy’s unit for teaching how to write a thesis statement . This bundle has everything you need to teach your students how to master their thesis statements and apply these essential literacy skills to their writing.

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Forming a Thesis Statement

Minilesson print.

The whole purpose of writing is to transfer an idea from your head into someone else's. If you can state your idea in a single, clear sentence, your reader can easily grasp it.

Use this simple formula to craft an effective thesis statement (for an essay) or topic sentence (for a paragraph).

Topic (who or what am I writing about? )

+ Focus (what specific thought or feeling do I have about my topic?)

_________________________________

= Thesis Statement (or Topic Sentence)

Here are some examples of the formula in action with different forms of writing.

Explanatory

Antibiotic resistance (topic) creates superbugs through the misuse of modern medicine (focus).

Sex and gender (topic) are related but different, one defined by biology and the other by culture (focus).

Narrative Writing

My hectic senior year of high school (topic) embodied the word overcommitment (focus) .

Your Turn Use the formula to create thesis statements for the following topics. Note: The focus is up to you.

• Career opportunities
• Community involvement
• Generational differences
• The search for colleges
• Lasting lessons of high school

From 30 in Write for College

Teacher Support:

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Answers will vary.

Standards Correlations:

The State Standards provide a way to evaluate your students' performance.

• 110.38.c.10.C
• 110.39.c.10.C
• 110.38.c.5.J
• 110.39.c.5.J
• LAFS.1112.W.1.1
• LA 12.2.1.b
• LA 12.2.2.a
• LAFS.1112.W.1.2
• 110.38.c.10.A
• 110.39.c.10.A
• LAFS.1112.W.1.3

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Teaching the Thesis Sentence

Most writing teachers agree that the thesis occupies a very important position, both in our student papers and in our teaching. We also agree that students tend to "rush" the thesis, and that the dominance (or even the presence) of a thesis (especially a premature thesis) can get in the way of a good paper. Accordingly, most writing instructors have a repertoire of methods to help students find a thesis that will focus and guide an interesting and persuasive academic paper. We offer some of those methods here, with the observation that these instructors in fact teach the thesis in multiple ways in their classrooms.

Tips for Helping Your Students to Write Better Theses

Here, then, are some things to try as you get students to write better theses:

• Respect their opinions (even if you don't agree with them), and show them how to harvest these opinions for academic purposes.
• Ask students to look for parts and patterns in a text and to develop their analysis from these patterns.
• Move your students back and forth, from the particular to the general, until they find the right "fit" between their particular observations and the Big Idea of the text.
• Ask them to develop an "umbrella idea" that synthesizes seemingly disparate observations.
• Instruct your students to look for hidden assumptions, both in the texts they're writing about and in their own work. Present the question: What needs to be true about the world for this claim to be true?
• Help your students expand their thesis sentences by introducing a counter-claim or complicating evidence. Then work with them to consider how to balance these claims in their paper/thesis.
• Debunk the thesis—and then debunk the debunking. Encourage students to keep looking for evidence that challenges their thesis (and not just evidence that supports it).
• Ask students to draw their papers. This frees them from thinking linearly and helps them to consider possibilities that might not have appeared to them otherwise.
• Warn students against common thesis problems, including the One-Size-Fits-All Thesis and the Laundry List Thesis. Encourage them to integrate their ideas rather than list them.
• Finally, remind students that there is no formula for a good thesis: form is dictated by idea, and not vice versa. Understanding the principles of style will help you and your students to create a sentence whose structure reflects the structure of the argument.

Shelby Grantham: Thesis Writing from the Solar Plexus

Professor Grantham's advice, in a nutshell, is "Find a topic that matters to you, and then figure out why it matters to you." This may sound like an obvious place to start, but it's not. Students are generally looking not for topics that interest them, but topics that interest the teacher—not understanding that we find it exciting to discover their arguments, their points of view.

Students often have very good instincts about paper topics, but they don't know what to do with their ideas. The first thing that they are likely to do is to take their good instinct for a paper topic and try to abstract it. Before attempting any abstractions, students should first consider why this topic, in particular, interests them. Professor Grantham has her students freewrite on a topic, asking them to explore their own feelings, experiences, and ideas. Students are not to worry about grammar, nor are they asked to consider structure. Rather, they are asked to respond as honestly and as fully as they can.

The instructor will then use this freewrite as the starting point for a conference about the paper that the student really wants to write. In that conference, Professor Grantham and the student "mine" the freewriting exercise for possible paper topics—not theses, but topics.

Once a topic is selected, students must consider it carefully before proposing a thesis. Professor Grantham will eventually ask students to do the necessary textual analysis or research, but before she does she asks students to unpack their own beliefs on the topic. Professor Grantham proceeds on the assumption that our students have a vast amount of information and opinion stored within, and that they have warrant for the beliefs they carry with them. She asks them to determine where they got the evidence for their beliefs—to trace the source of the belief to family members, friends, television. Once they've found the roots of their beliefs, they are then ready to decide whether they want to hold firm or change their minds.

Finally, students are ready (tentatively) to posit a thesis.

John Donaghy: Finding Patterns, Solving Problems

Professor Donaghy's method is founded on the understanding that analysis is a complicated process that requires us to break down a text (event, object, or phenomenon) into parts, discovering patterns among the parts, and coming up with a theory for why these patterns exist. Donaghy believes that students are initially afraid of analysis, and that their initial attempts at it are either overly simple, or disjointed and disorganized. He's puzzled by this fear, as we are analyzing all the time: life presents us with data that we are continually sorting by finding patterns, creating categories, and making meaning. Analysis is requisite for something as simple as crossing the street. Students can be encouraged to see that they already possess analytical skills that can be transferred to writing papers.

Professor Donaghy suggests three steps regarding a simple analysis of the following Gary Snyder poem, "Pine tree tops:"

In the blue night frost haze, the sky glows with the moon pine tree tops bend snow-blue, fade into sky, frost, starlight. The creak of boots. Rabbit tracks, deer tracks, what do we know.

First, when analyzing, students need to be conscious of examining parts of a text, looking for patterns (or repeating elements). In a short poem, students can make a number of simple observations, including:

• Number of words (34)
• Number of syllables in words (mostly single syllable)
• Parts of speech: mostly nouns; adjectives are scarce; surprisingly few verbs

Second, students need to try to determine how these parts and patterns are speaking to each other. Do these parts and patterns illustrate a similarity? Draw a contrast? Create an emphasis? Together form a new observation or idea? In terms of the poem:

• Nouns: so many nouns emphasizes the "thing-ness" of the poem
• Adjectives: very few; one (blue) is attached to a noun
• Verbs: the verbs (glows, bend, fade) are gentle, yielding verbs

Finally, students can put forward a proposition. For instance: Snyder builds his poem on nouns to give power to the "things" in his scene. OR Snyder chooses verbs that seem to yield to the nouns in order to tell us how to behave in the presence of nature. This proposition, with some tweaking, can become a working thesis.

Karen Gocsik: Finding the Umbrella Idea

Finding the "umbrella idea" requires that students move back and forth between a text's particularities and its big ideas in order to find a suitable "fit" between the two that the students can write about. This fit is summed up in the "umbrella idea," or the big idea that all of their observations can stand under.

Some students begin with a very specific observation about a text—for instance, that on page 264 of Milan Kundera'sImmortality, the heroine of his novel declares that her father was her only love. This observation can't yield a paper. So what does the student do? She generalizes the issue. In other words, she looks not at the individual father-daughter relationship but considers other father-daughter relationships in the novel. But this observation won't yield a paper, either. The student must think in particulars once again, comparing the relationships to find interesting patterns. What she comes up with is that in one relationship, the daughter looks to the father for guidance; in the other she sees that it's quite the opposite: the father believes that his daughter has wisdom and seeks her counsel. Again, still not much going on. It's time to generalize to the novel's big ideas—which include an attack on modernism and a nostalgia for the traditions of Europe. Interestingly, the father daughter relationships can be linked, via textual evidence, to these ideas. The student has discovered a "fit" between the big ideas and her particular observations that can yield a paper.

The key to success in this method rests in four processes:

• Students must move fluidly back and forth between the text and their abstractions/generalizations, ready to adjust their ideas to the new evidence and new abstractions that they encounter.
• Students must sketch their ideas. Drawing their ideas helps students pull their thinking out of linear, two-dimensional modes, enabling them to see multiple possibilities for their essays.
• Students must seek an umbrella idea, under which their ideas can stand. To get to this umbrella idea, they need not only to analyze but to synthesize: they need to bring disparate ideas together, to see if they fit.
• They further need to create this synthesis by playing with language, creating an umbrella sentence that can embrace their ideas. This requires that students write and revise their thesis sentence several times as they write their paper. It also requires that students have a basic understanding of the principles of style, so that they can understand how to place their ideas in appropriate clauses, create the proper emphasis, and so on.

Sara Biggs Chaney: Evolving the Thesis by Unpacking the Assumptions & Making Counter-Claims

Professor Chaney's method asks students to arrive at a thesis by examining their assumptions. She begins her instruction by introducing the student to the enthymeme. Like the syllogism (All men are mortal; Socrates is a man; therefore, Socrates is mortal), the enthymeme has three parts: the major premise, the minor premise, and the conclusion. The difference is that in the case of the syllogism the major premise is based on fact (All men are mortal), while in the enthymeme it's based on a commonly held belief (cheating is unethical, smoking around children is a danger to their health, etc.). As Professor Chaney notes, in many cases the enthymeme is presented with the major premise left unstated: She smokes around her daughter; she endangers her daughter's health. Professor Chaney illustrates the importance in finding the "missing" major premise, arguing that unpacking an argument's unstated assumptions can help students to better analyze the texts they're writing about, and to create better texts of their own.

The key question to ask is: What must be true about the world in order for this statement to be true? Students are asked to put forth all hidden assumptions, large and small. This forces the students to dig beneath the surface of the text, to explore the structure and the nuance of the argument. In the process, ideas for a thesis will present themselves.

Once the students have drafted a thesis, Professor Chaney has a strategy (borrowed from David Rossenwasser and Jill Stephen's Writing Analytically) for evolving the thesis by putting forward counter-claims. She has found Rossenwasser and Stephen's types of weak thesis statements—"Procrustes' Bed" and "The Laundry List"—useful in diagnosing logic problems in student writing. Students tend either to force a diversity of evidence to fit an overly rigid claim, or to present their claim in the form of a list, with few connections between the points. To evolve the thesis, Professor Chaney requires students to begin with their basic claim and then to methodically increase the complexity of that claim through the introduction of complicating evidence. This new evidence forces students to redefine their initial claims and to determine how the counter-claim might or might not be accommodated by their thesis.

For instance, a student may have written the following thesis: "Reported cases of autism in children have increased by almost 200% in the last twenty years because autism has been redefined to include less severe forms of the disorder." Professor Chaney presents them with this complicating evidence: "Some research also suggests that autism may be linked to mercury exposure in childhood vaccines." Students may weigh the evidence to see which has more merit; they might expand their thesis to point to two reasons for rising autism; they might acknowledge the truth in both statements but want to subordinate one argument to the other; they might point out a causal relationship between the two sentences (i.e., has the frequent levels of mercury exposures led to a new definition of autism in the DSM-IV, which in turn has increased the numbers of reported cases of autism?). Using any of these methods, students will have improved their thesis sentences.

Tom Cormen: Debunking (and Re-Debunking) the Thesis

Professor Cormen also recognizes that students are quick to "rush to thesis," and so he created an exercise to show students how additional information (research) can flesh out a thesis sentence. Professor Cormen presents students with a short poem, "Baseball's Sad Lexicon," written in 1908 by Franklin P. Adams, for the New York  Globe . The poem laments how often it seemed that the Chicago Cubs' infield, with Joe Tinker, Johnny Evers, and Frank Chance, turned double plays to stifle potential rallies by the New York Giants:

These are the saddest of possible words,  Tinker-to-Evers-to-Chance.  Trio of Bear Cubs, fleeter than birds,  Tinker-to-Evers-to-Chance.  Ruthlessly pricking our gonfalon bubble,  Making a Giant hit into a double,  Words that are weighty with nothing but trouble,  Tinker-to-Evers-to-Chance.

Professor Cormen points out to his students that Tinker, Evers, and Chance are all in the Baseball Hall of Fame. They must have formed one of the greatest double-play combinations ever. Or did they? To debunk the myth of Tinker-to-Evers-to-Chance, Professor Cormen gives his students another essay, written in 1954 by Warren Brown, called "Don't Believe Everything You Read." This essay challenges the Tinker-to-Evers-to-Chance mystique by doing a bit of investigating uncovering that, at the height of their careers (1906 - 1909), the Tinker-to-Evers-to-Chance combination turned only 29 double plays. By comparison, a second baseman with the Detroit Tigers participated in 150 double plays in 1950 alone, and a shortstop with the Cleveland Indians figured in 134 double plays in 1944. By demonstrating that players a few decades later were turning many times the double plays in one season that Tinker, Evers, and Chance were turning in four seasons, clearly the writer of this essay has debunked the legend of Tinker-to-Evers-to-Chance.

Or has he? Professor Cormen asks students to consider the differences between baseball in 1908 and 1950. First, he asks them to consider the conditions of baseball fields in 1908: the fields were pocked and rocky, far from the groomed surfaces that we see today or were the norm by 1950. Second, he asks them to consider the gloves: not the cestas we see on players' hands today, or even the webbed gloves that players wore by the 1940s, but more like the winter gloves that we wear today, without the insulation. Finally, he asks students to consider the ball: it was neither perfectly round (balls were not as hard before the 1920s, and when a batted ball went into the stands, it was thrown back onto the field and continued to be used) nor perfectly white (before the spitball was outlawed in 1920, balls were stained brown with tobacco juice, making them hard to see). Tinker, Evers and Chance were playing on a field like a parking lot, with gloves like a motorman's mitt, and with a ball that more resembled a mini-football than what we think of as today's baseballs. How could anyone expect them to turn 150 double plays per year? Clearly, with this additional evidence, students are moved to compose a more complex thesis.

The moral of the story: as students engage in research, they will encounter evidence that will debunk (or at least challenge) their ideas. Encourage this research, and support students as they work toward better thesis sentences.

Reading Worksheets, Spelling, Grammar, Comprehension, Lesson Plans

How to Write a Thesis Statement

About this worksheet:.

Practice developing thesis statements with this writing introduction worksheet! Students will learn how to improve their writing with a strong, attention grabbing thesis statement. This activity helps build writing skills by asking students to create a statement for the topics provided, such as: “What was the greatest challenge in your life?”.

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Definition of thesis

Did you know.

In high school, college, or graduate school, students often have to write a thesis on a topic in their major field of study. In many fields, a final thesis is the biggest challenge involved in getting a master's degree, and the same is true for students studying for a Ph.D. (a Ph.D. thesis is often called a dissertation ). But a thesis may also be an idea; so in the course of the paper the student may put forth several theses (notice the plural form) and attempt to prove them.

Examples of thesis in a Sentence

These examples are programmatically compiled from various online sources to illustrate current usage of the word 'thesis.' Any opinions expressed in the examples do not represent those of Merriam-Webster or its editors. Send us feedback about these examples.

Word History

in sense 3, Middle English, lowering of the voice, from Late Latin & Greek; Late Latin, from Greek, downbeat, more important part of a foot, literally, act of laying down; in other senses, Latin, from Greek, literally, act of laying down, from tithenai to put, lay down — more at do

14th century, in the meaning defined at sense 3a(1)

Dictionary Entries Near thesis

the sins of the fathers are visited upon the children

thesis novel

Cite this Entry

“Thesis.” Merriam-Webster.com Dictionary , Merriam-Webster, https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/thesis. Accessed 30 May. 2024.

Kids Definition

Kids definition of thesis, more from merriam-webster on thesis.

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Britannica.com: Encyclopedia article about thesis

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25 Thesis Statement Examples

A thesis statement is needed in an essay or dissertation . There are multiple types of thesis statements – but generally we can divide them into expository and argumentative. An expository statement is a statement of fact (common in expository essays and process essays) while an argumentative statement is a statement of opinion (common in argumentative essays and dissertations). Below are examples of each.

Strong Thesis Statement Examples

1. School Uniforms

“Mandatory school uniforms should be implemented in educational institutions as they promote a sense of equality, reduce distractions, and foster a focused and professional learning environment.”

Best For: Argumentative Essay or Debate

Read More: School Uniforms Pros and Cons

2. Nature vs Nurture

“This essay will explore how both genetic inheritance and environmental factors equally contribute to shaping human behavior and personality.”

Best For: Compare and Contrast Essay

Read More: Nature vs Nurture Debate

3. American Dream

“The American Dream, a symbol of opportunity and success, is increasingly elusive in today’s socio-economic landscape, revealing deeper inequalities in society.”

Best For: Persuasive Essay

Read More: What is the American Dream?

4. Social Media

“Social media has revolutionized communication and societal interactions, but it also presents significant challenges related to privacy, mental health, and misinformation.”

Best For: Expository Essay

Read More: The Pros and Cons of Social Media

5. Globalization

“Globalization has created a world more interconnected than ever before, yet it also amplifies economic disparities and cultural homogenization.”

Read More: Globalization Pros and Cons

6. Urbanization

“Urbanization drives economic growth and social development, but it also poses unique challenges in sustainability and quality of life.”

Read More: Learn about Urbanization

7. Immigration

“Immigration enriches receiving countries culturally and economically, outweighing any perceived social or economic burdens.”

Read More: Immigration Pros and Cons

8. Cultural Identity

“In a globalized world, maintaining distinct cultural identities is crucial for preserving cultural diversity and fostering global understanding, despite the challenges of assimilation and homogenization.”

Best For: Argumentative Essay

Read More: Learn about Cultural Identity

9. Technology

“Medical technologies in care institutions in Toronto has increased subjcetive outcomes for patients with chronic pain.”

Best For: Research Paper

10. Capitalism vs Socialism

“The debate between capitalism and socialism centers on balancing economic freedom and inequality, each presenting distinct approaches to resource distribution and social welfare.”

11. Cultural Heritage

“The preservation of cultural heritage is essential, not only for cultural identity but also for educating future generations, outweighing the arguments for modernization and commercialization.”

12. Pseudoscience

“Pseudoscience, characterized by a lack of empirical support, continues to influence public perception and decision-making, often at the expense of scientific credibility.”

Read More: Examples of Pseudoscience

13. Free Will

“The concept of free will is largely an illusion, with human behavior and decisions predominantly determined by biological and environmental factors.”

Read More: Do we have Free Will?

14. Gender Roles

“Traditional gender roles are outdated and harmful, restricting individual freedoms and perpetuating gender inequalities in modern society.”

Read More: What are Traditional Gender Roles?

15. Work-Life Ballance

“The trend to online and distance work in the 2020s led to improved subjective feelings of work-life balance but simultaneously increased self-reported loneliness.”

Read More: Work-Life Balance Examples

16. Universal Healthcare

“Universal healthcare is a fundamental human right and the most effective system for ensuring health equity and societal well-being, outweighing concerns about government involvement and costs.”

Read More: The Pros and Cons of Universal Healthcare

17. Minimum Wage

“The implementation of a fair minimum wage is vital for reducing economic inequality, yet it is often contentious due to its potential impact on businesses and employment rates.”

Read More: The Pros and Cons of Raising the Minimum Wage

18. Homework

“The homework provided throughout this semester has enabled me to achieve greater self-reflection, identify gaps in my knowledge, and reinforce those gaps through spaced repetition.”

Best For: Reflective Essay

Read More: Reasons Homework Should be Banned

19. Charter Schools

“Charter schools offer alternatives to traditional public education, promising innovation and choice but also raising questions about accountability and educational equity.”

Read More: The Pros and Cons of Charter Schools

20. Effects of the Internet

“The Internet has drastically reshaped human communication, access to information, and societal dynamics, generally with a net positive effect on society.”

Read More: The Pros and Cons of the Internet

21. Affirmative Action

“Affirmative action is essential for rectifying historical injustices and achieving true meritocracy in education and employment, contrary to claims of reverse discrimination.”

Best For: Essay

Read More: Affirmative Action Pros and Cons

22. Soft Skills

“Soft skills, such as communication and empathy, are increasingly recognized as essential for success in the modern workforce, and therefore should be a strong focus at school and university level.”

Read More: Soft Skills Examples

23. Moral Panic

“Moral panic, often fueled by media and cultural anxieties, can lead to exaggerated societal responses that sometimes overlook rational analysis and evidence.”

Read More: Moral Panic Examples

24. Freedom of the Press

“Freedom of the press is critical for democracy and informed citizenship, yet it faces challenges from censorship, media bias, and the proliferation of misinformation.”

Read More: Freedom of the Press Examples

25. Mass Media

“Mass media shapes public opinion and cultural norms, but its concentration of ownership and commercial interests raise concerns about bias and the quality of information.”

Best For: Critical Analysis

Read More: Mass Media Examples

Checklist: How to use your Thesis Statement

✅ Position: If your statement is for an argumentative or persuasive essay, or a dissertation, ensure it takes a clear stance on the topic. ✅ Specificity: It addresses a specific aspect of the topic, providing focus for the essay. ✅ Conciseness: Typically, a thesis statement is one to two sentences long. It should be concise, clear, and easily identifiable. ✅ Direction: The thesis statement guides the direction of the essay, providing a roadmap for the argument, narrative, or explanation. ✅ Evidence-based: While the thesis statement itself doesn’t include evidence, it sets up an argument that can be supported with evidence in the body of the essay. ✅ Placement: Generally, the thesis statement is placed at the end of the introduction of an essay.

Try These AI Prompts – Thesis Statement Generator!

One way to brainstorm thesis statements is to get AI to brainstorm some for you! Try this AI prompt:

💡 AI PROMPT FOR EXPOSITORY THESIS STATEMENT I am writing an essay on [TOPIC] and these are the instructions my teacher gave me: [INSTUCTIONS]. I want you to create an expository thesis statement that doesn’t argue a position, but demonstrates depth of knowledge about the topic.

💡 AI PROMPT FOR ARGUMENTATIVE THESIS STATEMENT I am writing an essay on [TOPIC] and these are the instructions my teacher gave me: [INSTRUCTIONS]. I want you to create an argumentative thesis statement that clearly takes a position on this issue.

💡 AI PROMPT FOR COMPARE AND CONTRAST THESIS STATEMENT I am writing a compare and contrast essay that compares [Concept 1] and [Concept2]. Give me 5 potential single-sentence thesis statements that remain objective.

Chris Drew (PhD)

Dr. Chris Drew is the founder of the Helpful Professor. He holds a PhD in education and has published over 20 articles in scholarly journals. He is the former editor of the Journal of Learning Development in Higher Education. [Image Descriptor: Photo of Chris]

• Chris Drew (PhD) https://helpfulprofessor.com/author/chris-drew-phd/ 17 Active Learning Examples
• Chris Drew (PhD) https://helpfulprofessor.com/author/chris-drew-phd/ Active Learning - Advantages & Disadvantages
• Chris Drew (PhD) https://helpfulprofessor.com/author/chris-drew-phd/ 11 Examples of Passive Learning
• Chris Drew (PhD) https://helpfulprofessor.com/author/chris-drew-phd/ 15 Top Stakeholders in Education

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Expository Writing for Elementary School Children

When your children come home from school with an expository writing assignment, your first thought as a parent might be, "Huh?" Expository writing is the moniker given to the kinds of writing assignments that simply used to be known as a report. And as such, expository writing, or writing reports, is simultaneously probably the most straightforward and the most challenging kind of assignments that kids will get in elementary school.

Understanding Expository Writing

The ability to write in an expository manner is a component of many careers, and as such, it's an important skill for your child to master.

Expository writing is used to describe, explain, define, or otherwise inform a reader about a specific subject. It’s devoid of opinion or unnecessary descriptive language.

Young students are typically taught to prepare expository writing by following a five-step model. For children just learning to organize their thoughts and write them down, the steps may consist of sentences. Older children may use paragraphs.

The first sentence or paragraph of an expository writing assignment will convey the main idea of the piece. If it's a paragraph, it should include a topic sentence that conveys the thesis clearly, without taking a position or resorting to opinion. The following three sentences or paragraphs will contain supporting details to buttress the main idea. The fifth sentence or paragraph will provide a summary of the piece, or conclusion, often restating the thesis or main idea.

Why It's a Challenge for Students

Unlike other writing assignments that children may get in school, which are designed to inspire them to use words and grammar in a proper fashion, the expository writing assignment has an overarching goal in addition to correct grammar and spelling.

Expository writing provides a challenge to the student because they must be able to organize their thoughts, follow a plan, and in higher grades, conduct research to support their thesis. Fulfilling these kinds of goals, in addition to spelling and using grammar correctly, asks children to think on multiple levels.

In particular, children who may be adept at grammar and spelling may struggle with conveying their thoughts in an organized fashion.

Younger children can be introduced to expository writing simply by having them write journalistically without forming opinions. The teacher might bring in a box of unfamiliar objects and ask students to describe them in writing. Descriptive writing is a great way to start students writing in a neutral tone. Children could compare opposites in writing , describing a summer day's activities versus a winter day's.

For older children, the time-honored book report is a classic exercise in expository writing. Students choose a book and craft a thesis about or a position on it. A topic sentence might identify what kind of book it is, or the kinds of readers for whom the book may be of interest and why. Subsequent sentences back up this assertion.

One good way to help older kids in their use of expository writing is to remind them to address the who, what, when, where, and why of the topic they've chosen. All five components may not always apply, but remembering to think about each of these aspects can help students write a compelling report.