Thesis Format

The thesis is the most important part of your undergraduate education. It’s where you show what you know and how well you can communicate it to others. If done right, a good thesis will make or break an A grade for any undergraduate course at Vancouver Island University (VIU). Here are some

Tips on writing a great thesis

• – Keep it simple! The more complicated the paper becomes, the harder it is to read and understand. Make sure that readers with less background knowledge than yourself could pick up your research findings without too much trouble.
• – Begin by writing out all of your ideas in paragraph form first before putting them into one large section as they flow through time – this way everything sense and there aren’t holes in the story.

The University format for a thesis

Title Page

This should include your name, program of study (undergraduate or graduate), academic year (e.g., 2019-2020) and full contact information including email address. It also has to contain an abstract located at the top where it says ‘Abstract’. Try not to exceed 200 words; this shouldn’t be hard because if you have chosen good research then there will only be about 100 relevant words anyway!

Stick with one idea per sentence here too – don’t go off on tangents. Next comes the keywords section which again shouldn’t take up more than five lines unless you have really long keywords…which probably means they are irrelevant so rethink them and cut it down to a more manageable amount!

The Introduction

This should be one paragraph that doesn’t exceed 200 words either. Here is where you let your reader know what you are going to discuss in this thesis, why it’s important for other people (i.e., which gap in research does it fill?) and how your findings contribute towards future studies/practices – again try not to make any assumptions here but state clearly all of these ideas within an argumentative framework instead; if there was good literature on the topic then refer back by name! That brings us nicely onto:

Literature Review

This section follows the same rules as the Introduction (200 word limit and no assumptions), however, it should only contain the most relevant and up-to-date literature on your topic. If there is a great deal of information then you either need to state why certain things aren’t important or cut down their importance in favor of more recent, pertinent research!

Methods

This section needs its own paragraph again (200 words). Within here you will explain how your study was conducted: what kind of methods where used? What were they specifically about? How many participants/subjects did they have etc.? You might want to include some photos if possible but this isn’t necessary for at least grad school theses. The next part follows with another 200 word limit that discusses who participated in your study – both demographics as well as specific backgrounds that are relevant or that you used to justify certain methods or approaches.

Results and discussion

This finalizes the thesis by presenting everything from your literature review so it’s important not to leave anything out – do this properly! The introduction might have been one paragraph but here is where you flesh things out more fully with no word limit whatsoever…write as much as you need until everything makes sense and flows smoothly.

Here is also where you present your research findings using numbers if possible (e.g., ‘Of the twenty participants I surveyed for my study, fourteen identified themselves as female’). Remember that every sentence its own idea though – don’t go off on tangents or make assumptions! Finally, state how these results contribute towards future studies/practices; what gaps in research does it fill? What can be done to further movement forward etc.?

Appendices

These are only included if they would help readers understand your topic better. Here you put more detailed information like questionnaires (that don’t include identifying info), raw data sets and anything else that is needed but isn’t necessarily part of the thesis itself…like photos for example. There again shouldn’t be any assumptions made here either – do not assume people will know why certain things are important without context so explain them fully within the text instead! If there aren’t enough append then attach some supplementary material at the end of the thesis.

– Once you are done writing, make sure to proofread your work before submitting! It is important not to overlook even the smallest typo or grammatical mistake because readers might not take your work seriously if it is full of errors. Quality over quantity is the key when it comes to getting an A on a thesis – make sure every word and sentence makes sense before you submit. You can do this by reading your work out loud or using one of many available free online tools like Hemingway App (used in my example). Have someone else read through it too, they might pick up something that you missed!