Your outline should include the following critical elements:
Introduction: A con
Your outline should include the following critical elements:
Introduction: A concise and clear overview of your topic. You can either launch directly into an explanation of your topic, or tease your topic with an interesting anecdote or story. Either way, though, the introduction should provide only the information necessary to grasp the basic information about your topic. As you are only trying to orient your audience, you should not try to discuss the entirety of your topic in the introduction nor fall prey to clichés (“Since the beginning of time…”; “Merriam Webster defines…”) that detract from your overall paper or presentation. Your thesis statement should appear at the end or close to the end of your introduction.
Body: The body of the paper is where you will lay out the evidence you have gathered that supports your thesis statement.
Conclusion: In your conclusion, you should summarize the main points you have addressed in the paper and provide an explanation of why your thesis statement and research matters.
Use of Sources: You should utilize the sources from your bibliography to help develop points within your paper. You should specifically indicate how you are planning to use each source to aid in your paper.
Writing Mechanics: There should be no spelling or grammatical errors, and all sources referenced should be correctly cited in a Bibliography. You should use Chicago/Turabian style and make sure to be consistent and correct in your citations. If you are unfamiliar with how to cite, Part II of your Turabian book provides a comprehensive list and examples of how to cite all types of sources.
