How to Develop an Opening Sentence for a Research Paper

The first sentence should be an attention-grabber, such as this picture demonstrates.

The first sentence of a research paper must lure your audience into reading further. The first sentence may be the thesis of the paper, or it may be a compelling statement to grab a reader's attention. Either way, the sentence needs to command attention from a reader and make them interested enough in the subject to want to continue reading.

Things You'll Need

• Audience
• Topic

Instructions

1. Answer a few questions before attempting to write the first sentence. What is the topic? What are you trying to communicate about the topic? Is there a different way to present the topic, such as with humor or a general fact? What is the required tone of the research paper?

2. Organize the answers to the questions according to priority. Prioritize the answers under the guidelines of the assignment.

3. Write a few sample sentences before finalizing the sentence to be used in the paper. Try wording the sentence differently or inserting different facts pertaining to the topic.

4. Proofread the sentences, then listen to the sentences being read by another person. Gather opinions from classmates or the professor regarding the sentences.

5. Decide on a final sentence based on the feedback of others, the topic choice and the facts presented in the sentence.

6. Proofread the sentence for grammatical errors. Check number agreement, punctuation, spelling, word choice or other common grammatical errors.

References

• A Research Guide for Students: How to Write an A+ Research Paper

Resources

• The Research Paper by Thomas R. Brown
• Grammar Errors