Talk: Reviewing the Research Portion of the Prewriting Step of the Writing Process

A research paper is not a giant fact dump.

If a psychology teacher says to write a paper about schizophrenia, it is not possible to just Google every fact there is about that topic and toss it into the paper like a salad.

Research needs a focus. That is what a thesis statement is for. A thesis statement is a sentence made up of a topic and a point that the writer will make about the topic.

EXAMPLE

topic: schizophrenia

point: there are currently three types of treatment for schizophrenia

A student writing a paper with this thesis statement would not go out and get gather random facts about schizophrenia; the student would gather only the facts that told about the three types of treatment for it.

Is this class, the thesis statements for the major essays will be assigned, but there will be a lesson on how to write thesis statements from scratch.