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Originally Posted by Winsor_Pilates
Agree with Carlson.
The main goal is to argue YOUR point as well as you can. IMO showing other theories is a big NO NO , unless you're using them to illustrate their flaws.
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Showing the other side of the argument is actually very important. Only stating the side that you have chosen makes one's paper look one sided, and/or weak; the reader might conclude that you are bias, or do not have a strong enough argument to defend. Bringing up the other side is like a test, if your argument is strong enough it will convince your audience that what you are saying is correct. Compare and contrast style essay are very good when you have to defend your thesis and can basically go like this,
Introduction: Introduce your audience to the topic matter. State your thesis. Bring up the topic matter of the individual paragraphs. Fade into your first paragraph. (In this paragraph you should either hint, or outright state, in a matter of words, the side you are choosing to defend).
Paragraph One: Bring up the first example and state why it is correct. Bring up a counter example that tries to disprove the conclusion of your argument point. Say why this counter example is false and defend your argument. Fade into the next paragraph. (Make sure you can discredit/disprove the counter example).
Paragraph Two: Bring up the second example and state why it is correct. Bring up a counter example that tries to disprove the conclusion of your argument point. Say why this counter example is false and defend your argument. Fade into the next paragraph. (Again, make sure you can discredit/disprove the counter example).
Paragraph Three: If you have another example and enough time follow the style of the previous paragraphs. If not this is the paragraph where you might have to do what I do best, bs your way through it. If you can, get creative and try to show why your argument is correct and why the counter argument is false, it's a place to tie up any loose ends if you made the mistake and have them. Fade into the next paragraph.
Conclusion: This is not the place to wrap up all loose ends and defend your argument. That should be done it the paragraphs themselves, or an extra bs paragraph. In the conclusion you restate what you said in your introduction in different words. The conclusion is a reminder of what you have said, if you have said everything correctly re-enforcement of it will convince your audience.
Here's some advice for you, the basic format for essays, power points, and presentations is as follows: Tell the audience what you are going to tell them, tell them what you have to tell them, tell them what you just told them. I was pretty good in Social Studies and raped the diploma. As such I'm not in the Social Science faculty at the U, if you need any more help with the format, or if you would like a few examples just pm me. Good luck mate, and I hope this helped!