Paper Titles to Help You Focus

A well crafted title shows work of advance planning. It also can save a student writer a lot of anguish later.

A good title sums up the focus of the work. Consider these rotten titles from my class about the Space Race and the first lunar landing:

•  "Neil Armstrong" or "Astronaut Courage" are lousy titles; they fail at giving us a focus beyond a general one.

• With a better title, the writer never loses sight of an essay's focus. In fact, as the writer drafts, the title provides a "reality check" to see if the draft has drifted off from the original intention.

• Sometimes writers "write their way" to a focus. When that happens, changing the title may be in order. 

• A title does not do the same as the governing claim (aka Thesis) that provides a why/so what for the focal point.

Now consider these better titles:

•  "Neil Armstrong's  Stoic Courage"  or "NASA's Decision to Make Neil The First Man"

Both tell a reader (and remind the writer)  where the essay will focus. Vagueness and generalizaiton are arch-enemies of all  academic work, in any field of study.