Attention Getting Devices

The first thing you want to do is to capture the reader's attention. You also want to set your essay above the norm with a moving, gripping opening. You can't do this by just regurgitating the thesis. So, what is an Attention Getting Device (AGD)?

It can be anything (keep it PG-13 for class work) which grabs the reader's attention, sympathy, emotions, or logic which can then be used to set up the rest of the essay. The key is to make the writing vivid and detailed. Put the reader inside your head. The following examples are very brief illustrations of what you can do with an AGD. You own AGDs should be much more developed than these examples.

What can be an AGD???:

• Personal Story -- When I was a little boy, my father often told me.....
• Startling statistics -- Over the next few months, over twenty percent of Americans will die from malnutrition. Twenty percent dead of malnutrition in the most advanced country in the world...
• Examples from Current Events -- The International Olympic Committee has been caught accepting bribery from cities interested in hosting the Games. Even an event as sacred as the Olympiad is not immune from human vices and weaknesses...
• Examples from Literature -- In Shakespeare's "Troilus and Cressida" the reader is shown, through the antics of Pandarus, that people are never who they seem to be. Cressida is hardly the pure little debutante that she wishes Troilus to see...
• Examples from Film -- In "Bladerunner" we see a future where human life has little or no meaning....
• Examples from Sport -- At 12:41 am, local time in Boston, the world froze for a moment as a baseball hung deep in left field right on the line between fair and foul ground. It was the thirteenth inning of the sixth game of the world series between the Red Sox and the Reds....
• Sad stories -- Little Suzy was a promising child until....

You get the idea. But the key is to be vivid and creative. It is a good thing to make the reader laugh, cry, or be moved by your words. Feel free to drag in things from your "walking knowledge" or what you are learning in your classes. It is amazing how much of this information can be used as an AGD.