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While it's usually 1 sentence long, students often find it tricky to highlight the key idea of a passage. That's why our essay writing service is here to help you. In this blog, we will shed more light on how to write a topic sentence for a body paragraph of an essay and provide decent examples to help you engage your readers. But before we get down to suggestion, let's begin with a definition.
What Is a Topic Sentence: Definition
A topic sentence is the first sentence of a body paragraph that captures its central point. By providing a succinct preview of the whole section, it serves as a roadmap and keeps writing organized.
A good topic sentence should be clear, concise and connected to a thesis statement. Your task is to grab the reader's attention, encouraging them to continue reading. Additionally, you will need to back up your key point by evidence and in-depth analysis.
Topic sentences also act as transitions that link paragraphs to one another. It's like building a bridge between sections allowing readers to move fluently throughout your essay.
Topic Sentence vs Thesis: What's the Difference?
Quite often, students confuse a topic sentence with a thesis statement. Let's clarify the difference between these 2 components.
A thesis statement is the main argument of the whole paper. It usually appears at the end of an essay introduction and presents your central position or claim. A topic sentence introduces the main idea of a single paragraph and should relate back to your thesis.
Take a glance at this example to understand the distinction.
What Is the Purpose of a Topic Sentence?
The primary purpose of a topic sentence boils down to emphasizing on the point you want to make in any specific section. It also serves other goals:
Now that you know what a topic sentence in an essay body is and its purpose, let's discuss its main types.
Types of Topic Sentences and Examples
There are multiple approaches to previewing your paragraph's main point. Depending on the essay type, you may opt for different types of topic sentences – cause and effect, problem-solution, comparison and contrast. They can also appear in the form of a suggestion, question or a simple transition. Below we will define each type and provide topic sentence examples.
General to Specific
This type of topic sentence begins with a broad statement and then narrows down to a specific point.
Specific to General
In this case, you will start with a particular detail and then broaden out to a larger point.
Cause and Effect
Such sentences present a causal relationship between 2 ideas, events or phenomena. This type of topic sentence is usually used in cause and effect essays.
Comparison and Contrast
Sometimes, you may be assigned to compare 2 different concepts. If you are writing a compare and contrast essay, you will need to build topic sentences for each paragraph that reflect the comparison.
Problem-Solution
As the name suggests, this type of sentence primarily focuses on how to solve a specific issue. You will use this approach when working on a problem-solution essay.
Advice/Suggestion
Suggestions are an integral part of most kinds of essays. Whether you are writing a persuasive essay or a how-to guide, you need to express an opinion and provide a call for action. That's when you will turn your topic sentence into a piece of advice or guideline.
Question
Sometimes, you may open a paragraph with a question in order to entice the reader and make them more interested in your opinion. Such questions should be used sparingly and confined to the introduction.
Transition
When you are navigating from one paragraph to another, it is important that you make a seamless connection between ideas. The goal is to make the reader feel like they are continuously progressing through your essay. That's when essay transition words come into play. Here's how to create a topic sentence that can be used for linking.
How to Write a Good Topic Sentence for an Essay: 5 Easy Steps
When writing a topic sentence, there are 2 important aspects to keep in mind:
Now let’s take a look at the steps involved in the process. Follow these detailed guidelines on how to write a topic sentence and arrange your essay properly.
1. Determine the Main Idea of Your Writing
Before you write a topic sentence for body paragraphs, identify your essay’s main idea, or the point you’re trying to prove. The key argument is usually hidden in your thesis statement. Read through your thesis and think about the overall point that you are trying to make. Powered by the main idea, you can start thinking how to structure your body paragraphs and what specific points to discuss in each section.
2. Break Down the Main Idea into Smaller Pieces
The next step is to split your idea into smaller points. Try to recognize major supporting points or subtopics that reinforce your thesis statement. It can be helpful to create an outline or diagram to map out the essay structure and organize your arguments. By doing so, you will see how your central idea can be separated into more manageable subpoints.
>> Read more:
3. Make Sure Each Body Paragraph Serves a Specific Purpose
The purpose of each body paragraph is to take one of the subpoints and explain it in detail. In order to do that, make a topic sentence focused and to the point.
One common mistake is integrating too many details in one sentence.
Remember, the goal of your topic sentence is to introduce a single idea. For that, you need to establish the evidence and examples you want to use in your paragraph. Once you are clear on the goal of each paragraph, you can start creating your topic sentence.
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In the above topic sentence example, a student combines 2 different ideas in 1 sentence. Eventually, this may lead to unnecessary confusion. Here's how this sentence may be improved.
4. Grab Reader's Attention
The best topic sentence is the one that sounds compelling and captivates the reader's attention. Just like in the essay introduction, here you also need to integrate a hook. There are several hook techniques that you can use to involve your audience in your body paragraph:
Example
>> Learn more: How to Write a Hook for an Essay
Trigger words can also be used to persuade your audience read further. These are the words and phrases that evoke emotions or psychological reactions. Below you can find some of the most efficient trigger words for your topic sentences.
Cause | Compelling | Demonstrate |
Effect | Provocative | Highlight |
Solution | Controversial | Argue |
Finding | Effective | Explore |
Challenge | Critical | Analyze |
Opportunity | Challenging | Support |
Development | Intriguing | Refute |
Benefit | Puzzling | Explain |
Limitation | Unexpected | Clarify |
Trend | Impactful | Evaluate |
When you write a topic sentence that elicits a strong emotional response, you will be able to interest more readers.
5. Write a Topic Sentence
Before you get down to actually writing a topic sentence for an essay body paragraph, remember that it should contain condensed information on your point. Still, you don't want to give away all supporting details or evidence from the get-go. Try to find balance between introducing your ideas and leaving some space for developing your argument further in the body.
Keep in mind the overall structure and flow of your essay. Your topic sentence should match a larger claim stated in your thesis. Otherwise, it will appear out of context and may potentially ruin the entire argument.
Examine good topic sentences examples for essays presented below to get more ideas on how to create your own.
Essay Topic Sentence Examples
Whether you're writing an argumentative, descriptive, or narrative essay, a strong topic sentence plays a crucial role in setting the stage for your main ideas. In this section, we will offer multiple examples of topic sentences. Inspect each topic sentence example for an essay to see how theory can be implemented in practice.
Topic Sentence Writing Tips
Here are some valuable tips for writing a powerful topic sentence in a paragraph.
Bottom Line on How to Write a Topic Sentence
Crafting a powerful topic sentence is not easy, but with practice, you will be able to start your paragraphs in a convincing manner. Make sure that each opening is clear and reflects your main idea in a brief, yet, meaningful way. Keep these tips and examples in mind when writing topic sentences for your next essay.

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Daniel Howard is an Essay Writing guru. He helps students create essays that will strike a chord with the readers.
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