3 Strategies Involved in Outlining a Paper

Each of the paragraphs involved in your paper is expected to serve a specific purpose in the paper. When you carry out an outline of your first draft; it will serve as the assurance needed to ensure that each part connects with each other.

Outlining also serves the purpose of determining the strengths as well as the weaknesses in your paper.  This will come in useful where there is no time revising your paper. So how does an outline look like? We shall be giving a sample of what is involved in an outline straightaway.

Introduction

This is where you are expected to prepare your clients for the major points of your argument. You must be specific here. Do not include a general angle of view here. You have to be specific in your approach at this point in time.

Purpose statement

This comes immediately after your introduction and the purpose is to tell the audience the idea behind the central argument of your paper. There should be a link between your introduction and the purpose statement. The introduction should prepare the mind of your readers for the purpose statement.

Background

The next thing in the line of actions will be your background. You are allowed to include a literature review that shows what is already known about the subject. Here, you are expected to point out errors in the current literature review which you intend to work on and improve on in your paper.

The major and minor claims

This can be referred to as the building point of your paper. It is expected of every scholar to be organized in the approach here. Every point should progress in stages and must move in one direction- conclusion.

The paragraphs involved here should connect with each other. The buildup should be in such a way as to show a progression of the points in an organized fashion. Each of the major points should represent a clear statement. There should be a connection between every point that is raised here to the central theme of your paper.

We cannot forget the minor points which must form part of the discourse in your paper. These are the subtopics that are included within the major points. The purpose is to discuss the nuisance of your major points. This should not take the shine off your major points of argument. It is a mere extension of your major points of argument.

Conclusion

Like it was stated earlier; the major point must link together to point in the direction of the conclusion. This concluding point will emphasize the importance of what you have discussed in your major points of arguments. It is not a repeat of what you have written earlier.

It is a summary of your major claims which must be tied to a larger discussion. Your to expertly state the relevance of your thesis statement to the realities of the present situation of things.

Final thought

The strategies outlined above are all that is required to get the best out of an outline of any paper that you are involved in.