The Things They Carried English IOP help?

[DangerStar19]

So, I'm an IB Junior and I have to start working on my English IOP for The Things They Carried by Tim O'Brien today. I wasn't sure where to start, so I asked my teacher and she said to start with a thesis. However, I'm awful at writing these. I've already decided on a topic and picked out a bunch of quotes/passages that I want to talk about, but I don't know how to form this into and organized presentation.

The topic (or thread) I've chosen is the relationship between courage and pride in the novel. For example, one of the passages I want to use is when Norman Bowker is describing all the medals he received, but how he didn't receive the silver star.

"And his [bowker's] father would have nodded, knowing full well that many brave men do not win medals for their bravery, and that others win medals for doing nothing. As a starting point, maybe, Norman Bowker might then have listed the seven medals he did win: the Combat Infantryman's Badge, the Air Medal...He would've explained to his father that none of these decorations was for uncommon valor."

So basically, can anybody guide me in writing a thesis on this topic/thread? Maybe like a template that I can go from or something? Thanks so much in advance!!

Edited November 3, 2013 by DangerStar19

[Carlos Hartmann]

Well, I just started my EE on that book; it's absolutely amazing in my opinion.

For your IOP I recommend looking for more passages and quotes from the book. Your thesis must state what all these passages have in common in terms of meaning. You should make notes for every passage saying what its content is.

For the mentioned passage it would be: The text says that soldiers are motivated to be brave by medals which make their relatives proud.

And if you do this for every passage you are going to notice a pattern which might be: The text says that soldiers do not seek to be brave but rather seek recognition. (Just an example, I don't know what the text actually says about valor and pride)

And there you go - a thesis.

Then you show how you arrived at this thesis and you have a basic structure for argumentation.

I hope I was of any help.

[DangerStar19]

Awesome! That helped a lot. From that, I formed this thesis statement:

Author Tim O’Brien emphasizes a relationship between pride and courage in his novel The Things They Carried in order to display the affect that these emotions have on the soldiers.

What do you think of it? Do you think it's good, or that I should edit it. Thanks again!

[Carlos Hartmann]

Awesome! That helped a lot. From that, I formed this thesis statement:

Author Tim O’Brien emphasizes a relationship between pride and courage in his novel The Things They Carried in order to display the affect that these emotions have on the soldiers.

First, it's *effect, not affect if I'm not mistaken.

And I think you can improve that thesis to make it more "workable". "The effects" is put rather generally. You should definitely state the effects on the soldiers in the thesis as in: "He emphasizes a relationship between courage and pride in order to show that they motivate the soldiers, make them anxious and make the horros of war more supportable. (Again, just an example. Summarise your own findings here.)

The great thing about clearly stating all the effects is that your structure and development are going to be more clear and get more points.

If a thesis is like "Author does XY in order to A, B and C."

Your work can then be:

1) The author does XY in order to A. This can be seen here, there and in this passage. Here, XY can be seen in this sentence and the effect of it ETC."

2) The author does XY in order to B. ETC

3)The author does XY in order to C.

Like this, the teacher can't miss what your work is all about and he can immediately see that you gave your work a logical structure -> more points in one of the Criteria. It doesn't matter whether it is an essay or a presentation. The teacher will always notice when the thesis dictates your structure (which is good).

Feel free to post more stuff if you need a comment.

Also, I'm just another guy doing IB, not an expert. Grain of salt

[Blackcurrant]

Looks like you've got some good advice alreadyDangerStar 19 . As I pointed out elsewhere...., you will want to ask yourself where this investigation leads: what will your discussion - which will be a literary treatment of both works-- reveal of your understanding +literary appreciation of both works? "Appreciation" as I guess you already know, means "the act of estimating the qualities of things and giving them their proper value. and clear perception or recognition, especially of aesthetic quality:rather than just "like" in the loose everyday sense . Ignore the highlighting..dont know what happened ..