Hey, welcome to Writing Tip of the Day with Mrs. Lawrence and Mr. Anderson. I'm Mr. Anderson and for our topic today we are going to be talking about introductions. We'll talk a little bit about the purpose of an introduction. I will show you the eight major types of introductions and then we'll talk about how to pick the correct introduction for your paper. So to start out with, let's talk a little bit about the purpose of introductions. Representatives are the hook that really pulls in the reader and makes them want to read the rest of your paper. It should also lead your reader towards your thesis, whatever it is you're trying to inform them about or persuade them about. Your introduction needs to be appropriate and relevant to your thesis. It needs to capture the interest of your readers and it needs to connect to your topic. There are really eight main types of introductions and I'm going to tell you about each of them. Now of course there probably are other ways but these are the primary ones that we want to share with you. Each of them has their own benefits, each of them has their own liabilities. So you need to consider your topic and your audience when thinking about which is best for your paper. You could also consider mixing a couple of them together to form something new if that would fit your paper. The first one I want to talk about is the question and this is the one that pops into everybody's mind when they think of an introduction and that's why it is so common and so overused. The plus side of the question is that it provides a nice entry point to the topic. It gets everybody thinking about what you're going to talk about but like I mentioned before, it is very, very, very overused. It's kind of like the default setting for introductions and in fact some teachers will say just don't do the question introduction. Here's an example. If you were going to use it, have you ever heard of a flesh eating virus? All right, let's get moving on here. Number two type of introduction is the incident. The incident is a true story, something that happened to you or somebody close to you. The nice thing about the incident introductory type is that it gives you instant credibility as a writer because it happens specifically to you or someone that you know. For example, we have this example here. I had a neighbor who didn't wear his seatbelt and now he's in a coma. Services of very good introduction as to why you should wear your seatbelt. Especially if it's true that you actually did have a neighbor that didn't wear their seatbelt. Now you've kind of hooked everyone into the paper. They want to find out the story. They want to find out what happened and that instantly hooks them in. The number three method of introduction is the example. Very similar to the incident, except in this case you use a current event story or create a hypothetical story. It's a good introduction to topics but it's not as effective as the incident because it's not a true story. You're making it up. An example of this would be imagine you are home alone. You hear a strange noise in the basement. It's okay but again not as effective probably as the incident but again if you don't have a true story that fits in with your topic this might be a good method to use. Number four is the analogy. The analogy is especially good if you want to explain something unfamiliar by using familiar terms and it's also a good way to personalize lofty or kind of heady intellectual topics. Let's look at the example first here. A successful business without an advertising budget is like an airplane without a propeller. Again, serves as kind of an interesting way to think about a topic. Get people to think about it in a way that they might not have considered before. Next one, the quotation for this one literally just what it says. You take a witty meaningful saying from an expert and you put it into your paper. This can lend credibility to your argument. It can be very thought provoking if used properly. You want to make sure however that you pick someone that people would know or that you pick someone that people would trust to increase that credibility. You don't want to choose a person that might undermine your credibility. So here we have Walter Goodman talking about the idea of an all out nuclear war being unsettling. That's a good introduction to the nuclear war topic. All right, let's keep going. Number six, background information. This is where you just get into the facts and figures. You look up historical information. You look up data that will inform your reader. This helps to add to your logical scientific appeals. Again, a good example here. In 2003, seatbelts saved an estimated 14,903 lives of passenger vehicle occupants over a four years old. And then of course, you always want to cite your source. You want to show where you got that information. Number seven is the description. You literally describe, that's where it gets the name, a place, a person or an object to inform the reader or to create a certain mood. This is nice if you want to create a certain tone early on in your paper or else if you are talking about a place that is unfamiliar to a lot of the people. For example, here, the bell tower sits alone on a hill high above town. In the same spot it has set since 1684. I say that's long enough. Let's build a 7-11. That's the sort of thing that you want to do just kidding folks. That's what you want to do to create that description to talk about a place to set the mood. Then we have the definition. This is literally just the dictionary definition of the word or phrase. This is especially useful if you're using an unfamiliar term in your paper. But sort of like the question, this one has gotten to be fairly overused over the years. What you want to do is only use this one if there is a term in your paper that is going to be widely unfamiliar. You don't want to do it if you're only using terms that people know because it just doesn't make sense. The other seven options would be much better for you. But if you are going to use it, use it, and be sure to cite your source, such as in here, Webster's Dictionary defines nuclear power as and then go on with your topic. Those are the eight major types of introductions. When you are looking for the introduction for your paper, you need to make sure that you do the following things. You want to make sure that it links to your topic. Make sure that your story, your definition, your question, etc. All tie together with what your paper is about. You want to try and find a unique approach. Remember, probably in your class, there's 30 people writing a paper. You want to try and find a way to make yours unique and interesting. Find a way to make it memorable. You want to make sure that your introduction is a tool that moves your reader towards your thesis and the rest of your paper. And if you really are thinking ahead, it's always good to reference your introduction when it comes time for your conclusion to kind of bring things full circle. That's your writing tip for the day. Happy introduction writing, and we'll see you in one of the other presentations. Have a good one!