1. Developing Body Paragraphs

2.  Before you begin speaking, take a few
seconds to think about how you will organize
your response. You should include these
parts in every spoken response:
Introduction: State your purpose.
Body: Take the majority of your time to give
examples and details which refer back to
your purpose.
Conclusion: Finally, summarize your
thoughts.

3.  Body paragraphs are the place where the
author, or speaker, develops his or her ideas.
While the introduction states the purpose,
the body paragraphs provide specific details
to support that purpose.
 Note that your responses will only be 1
minute, which means you will have a limited
amount of time to develop your body
paragraphs.

4.  The body paragraphs are when an author
attempts to accomplish his or her purpose by
presenting facts, arguments, and evidence.
 A good body paragraph contains the
following elements:
1. A topic sentence that introduces the main
point of the paragraph.
2. Examples, facts, and evidence that help
the author achieve his or her purpose.

5.  A good topic sentence does two things: It
provides a transition between ideas and clearly
states that main idea of the paragraph.
 Let’s look back at the introduction we
established before:
“I think the most important job I’ve had was
working at a library. I believe this because I met
many interesting people at this job.”
Now, each spoken body paragraph should begin
with a topic sentence that supports your
introduction.

6.  Therefore, a good topic sentence for the first
body paragraph might be:
“Working at the library was my most
important job because I met Professor
Martin, who has become my advisor this
semester.”
The topic sentence is introducing your idea
(the job was important because you met
Professor Martin), and then the rest of your
body paragraph will give details that support
your examples. Perhaps Professor Martin
convinced you to change your major,
suggested you submit an article to the
school’s literary magazine, or hinted at a

7.  Another good topic sentence is one that
indicates a progression of ideas by using the
phrase “One reason…”
 In this instance, a good topic sentence might
be:

“One reason that my job at the library was
important is that I met Professor Martin, who
has become my advisor this semester.”

8. Other phrases that accomplish this
progression are as follows:
Another reason
Second
Additionally
Moreover
Third
First
Furthermore
 These are transition statements that help you
move from one idea to the next. Each
succeeding topic sentence should have a
transition statement and connect back to the
thesis.

9.  The topic sentence for our next body
paragraph might use the following transition:
“Another reason that my job at the library
was important is that I met Dr. Lucas, who
asked me to edit the book he was writing.”
And then the rest of the body paragraph will
provide details that support this example.
By writing topic sentences that connect ideas
in this way, your response will sound well
structured and will be easy to follow.

10.  To support your thesis statement, you will
want to provide details or information, usually
in the form of facts or reasons.
 Your examples should be:
1. Specific: They should not be vague or too
general.
2. Explained: Make sure you give details to
support your examples.

11. Statement 1: State your example and tie it back to your
thesis.
Statement 2: Give one reason why your example is
relevant to your thesis.
Statement 3: Add detail to reason #1.
Statement 4: Give another reason why your example is
relevant to your thesis.
Statement 5: Add detail to reason #2.
Statement 6 (optional): Provide a summary of your
reasons and relate them to your thesis.