Being able to define a thesis statement is an imperative skill in the HSC.

The success of your English essay almost entirely hinges on how good your THESIS is. Your essay should be understood as an extended exposition of your thesis, with every point being a further piece of evidence in favour of it. All our students concede either that they don’t know what a thesis is, or that they are simply no good at formulating one. Given its association with 100,000 word PHDs, it’s understandable that students should find such a concept daunting or beyond comprehension. So what on Earth is a thesis? Is it even understandable to us lowly, terrestrial mortals?

Demystifying the Thesis is what we do best here at Save my HSC, in deed it came in at a close second as a brand name. Here’s how you should go about finding one:

1)   Read the syllabus for the Module in question. Every module has a conceptual focal point and a particular idea that it explores by using key words. View these key words and thematic concerns as tips, suggestions and directions on where to go with your own thesis.

2)   Your thesis is the over-arching concept/idea that is supported by all the succeeding points in your essay: it is the most general and abstract statement you’ll make in your essay.

3)   Your thesis MUST respond to whatever primary theme/idea the Module explores. The form your thesis must take is as the main argument you wish to prove, the stance and position you’ve arrived at in relation to the Module. The rest of your essay will be the specific points you wish to state, with evidence of course, that support your thesis.

4)   As a rule of thumb, a good thesis is often a pithy, wise claim about what it is to be human, what Hannah Arendt dubbed “the human condition.”. Or it demonstrates an insight into the process and purpose of literature and art. A philosophical statement with a little more profundity than a Hallmark quote goes a long way here.

If you stick to these pearls of advice, your thesis creation will be a much less laborious task, and your essays will benefit immeasurably. One of the first things we work on with new tutoring students is defining a thesis statement.