Have you searched for a guide on how to write a claim for an argumentative essay but came out empty?
You’ve come to the right place.
Whether you’re looking forward to working on a difficult argumentative essay topic or you already have easy subject to work on, this guide will show you how to write a claim that you can defend using evidence and reason.
Key Takeaways
- A claim is a declaration sentence subject to debate.
- Claims are different from topic sentences in that they appear only in the thesis statement of the essay. A topic sentence appears in every paragraph of an essay.
- For a sentence to be a claim, it should communicate a message that engages an audience to do something or act in a certain way.
What is a Claim in an Argumentative Essay?
A claim in an essay is a debatable statement and a part of an argument’s declaration sentence. In respect to academic writing standards, a claim must exclude personal feelings and already known facts and it must leave room for debate.
Just as personal opinions are unacceptable in argumentative writing, a claim must not have a link to how you feel about a subject. Rather making a bold statement that potentially demonstrate that you’re right about an issue, you must bind your claim up for inquiry within the specific subject.
The purpose of a claim in an argument is to convince, persuade, or give proof to move your audience to agree with your point of view. You can focus on communicating a message, but it’s best to double down on moving an audience to think in a certain way.
Types of Claims in Argumentative Essay
A claim is one of the elements that drive an argument. For the best outcome, you need to use the right type of claim depending on the topic presented in the prompt.
You can make a:
- Claim of fact
- Claim of definition
- Claim of cause and effect
- Claim of value
- Claim of policy
Let’s look at each of these types of claims to help you understand what they mean.
Claim of Fact
How valid is the statement you’re about to give? Is there an element of truth in the statement you intend to present?
Should such be the statement you want to present, you’re looking at making a claim of fact.
A claim of fact mainly presents an argument that demonstrates whether something is true or false. It holds that if you’re going to challenge what we consider as facts, you must have concrete research to back it up.
Claim of Definition
A claim of definition argues about definitions of things or phenomena. Ideally, you may argue that something means another thing altogether, even if some people don’t consider your definition sounding.
Rather than offering a discount explanation of your claim, you shouldn’t hesitate to give your personal explanation. However, you must ensure that you sound neither emotional nor biased.
Pay attention to the information that you provide when dealing with a claim of definition. Remember that when writing an argumentative essay, even a claim of definition must be debatable.
Claim of Cause and Effect
The claim of cause and effect requires you to do two things:
First, you should describe the cause of an event. Second, you should explain the implication or impact the issue has.
By doing so, your essay will be so comprehensive and valuable that you earn top grades.
Claim of Value
If you’re going to base your argument on the significance of the topic in question, you will have to make a claim of value.
Claim of Policy
You can also make a claim of policy in your argumentative essay.
This type of claim seeks to give readers the reasons why they should care about what you have to say. It also should suggest what they should do after reading your essay.
How to Write a Claim for an Argumentative Essay
You’ve learned three important things so far. You know what claim is in an essay, why the claim is important, and the types of claims you can write in your argument.
But how do you write a claim for an argumentative essay?
1. Explore the Essay’s Topic
Exploring your focus topic is a good way to determine what claim can best fit in your argumentative essay.
Whether you’ve selected your own idea or received a focus topic from your teacher, you should do preliminary research and develop concrete ideas that you can easily argue.
Let’s say you’re working on a topic about global warning. Deforestation would make a good focus topic here. From this, you can present evidence and give reasons why cutting down trees is the major cause of global warming.
2. Ask a Question
Narrowing down to a specific subject has two benefits.
- It’s easy to come up with tons of useful ideas for your central argument.
- You can develop reasonable questions to help you develop a relevant claim for the essay.
The most relevant question for the project is one that summarizes your thoughts. For the claim to be bold, you must follow the question with a short, clear, and direct response to summarize your positon.
3. Determine the Goal of the Essay
Another way to come up with a strong claim for an argumentative essay is to look at the assignment brief once more to understand the primary goal of the argument.
Determining the goal of the assignment can help you to develop a claim that can easily challenge the opinion of your readers regardless of what they assume to be true.
From a writing standpoint, your essay will focus on multiple issues. However, you’ll need to ensure that they all tie together to address the central theme in the thesis statement. In this respect, your claim should demonstrate a clear stand on the main issue.
4. Take a Unique Approach
We’ve looked at hundreds of argumentative essay samples in the last few months. What we discovered is a similarity in the way students approach the assignment.
Either they state arguable facts followed by blunt claims.
There’s nothing with this. The problem, though, is that it becomes difficult to grab the attention of a reader.
So we recommend that you take a different approach. By doing so, you can write a claim that’s not only interesting but also sustainable.
Our team of professional writers and editor, who hold college and university degrees in various fields will research, write, and validate the information in the essay and deliver results that exceed your expectations.