Every argument rests on a claim — an assertion the writer wants you to accept. It might be a claim of fact (“students are reading less than they did a decade ago”), of value (“that loss is more serious than it looks”), or of policy (“schools should protect a daily reading hour”). Your first job with any passage is to find the central claim and separate it from the smaller claims that support it.
Central claim vs. sub-claims
A well-built argument is layered. At the top sits the central claim (sometimes called the thesis) — the one thing the writer most wants you to believe or do. Beneath it sit sub-claims: smaller assertions that each support the central claim. Beneath those sits the evidence.
The central claim is not always the first sentence, and it is not always stated outright. Writers often open with a story or a question and let the claim arrive later — or leave it implied, trusting the audience to assemble it. Ask: if the writer could make me believe only one sentence, which would it be?
[Diagram — see the figure in the print workbook.]
Stated vs. implied claims
A stated claim is written on the page. An implied claim must be inferred from the evidence and tone. Skilled writers imply claims they think would meet resistance if stated bluntly — letting the reader feel they reached the conclusion themselves.
In the passage below, the central claim is never stated as a command. Read it and decide what the writer wants the reader to do.
The Empty Reading Hour — Original passage for this workbook
For years our school kept a quiet hour after lunch when every classroom simply read. No worksheet followed it, no quiz. Students chose their own books, and teachers read beside them.
This fall the hour is gone, traded for one more block of test practice. I have watched the same students who once carried novels down the hall now scroll through their phones in the minutes between classes, reading nothing longer than a caption. We told ourselves we were adding rigor. What we quietly subtracted was the one part of the day that taught them to want to read at all.
The central claim here is implied: the school should restore its daily reading hour. The writer never issues that command — the traded-away hour and the scrolling students make the reader draw the conclusion for themselves.
Worked example 1
Locate the central claim and one sub-claim in the passage below.
A Word to the House Physicians — Original passage in the manner of a period hospital-reform essay
It is urged that requiring every physician to wash his hands between patients is an insult to gentlemen of medicine and a waste of a busy ward's minutes. I answer that it is the cheapest medicine we possess, and the one we most stubbornly refuse to take.
The fever passes down the ward in the order the doctor makes his rounds, and stops at the bed he reaches last. This is not chance. If a clean hand costs us a minute and a moment's pride, and a dirty one costs a mother her life, then the arithmetic is not close, and no man's dignity is worth the difference.
Central claim: physicians should wash their hands between patients — it is cheap, effective “medicine” that the profession wrongly refuses. It answers the objection in the first sentence, which is your clue that it is the thesis.
A sub-claim: the fever spreads along the very route the doctor's hands travel, so the doctor is a carrier — and a minute of washing costs far less than a life. Notice how the sub-claim does real work: it supplies a reason (cause of spread, cost-benefit) rather than just repeating the claim.
Common trap: The topic is not the claim
Students often answer “what is the writer's claim?” with the topic: “the passage is about the reading hour.” A topic is a noun; a claim is a full sentence that could be argued with. “The reading hour” is a topic. “The school traded away the one habit that made students want to read” is a claim.
Test yourself: could a reasonable person disagree with what you wrote? If not, you have named the topic, not the claim.
Hack: The 'only-one-sentence' test
To find the central claim fast, ask: if the writer could make me believe only one sentence in this whole passage, which sentence would it be? Everything else exists to make that sentence land.
Then check your answer against the opening objection or question, if there is one. Arguments very often state the thing they are answering early (“It is said that…,” “It is urged that…”) and the central claim is the reply.
