Reading to Learn: Superstar Summarizers!
Rationale:
The main goal for this lesson is reading comprehension. The strategy that we are
going to focus on for reading comprehension is summarizing. Summarizing is the
process of finding and picking out the most important information from a text.
Comprehension leads to successful reading. With this lesson students will be
learning the step of summarization. Students will learn how to be able to
identify the main information, to not focus on the redundant information, and
how to relate main idea with the supporting details. We will be using an article
to read and write a summary.
Materials:
Paper, pencils, highlighters for each student
Dry erase board and dry erase markers
Copy of the article "Firefly"
Copies of the article "African Elephant"
Procedures:
1. First we will go over what reading comprehension and summarization are. I
will introduce reading comprehension and summarization to the class. Reading
comprehension is a skill where a reader fully understands what he or she read.
The reader comprehends or understands what the text is telling them. One
strategy that helps with reading comprehension is summarization. Summarizing is
a strategy where you find the most important information in a text that will
help retell the story in a couple of sentences. A summary mainly focuses on the
main idea and details.
2. In order to be a good summarizer we must follow a few rules. I will go over
these rules with the class so they fully understand them. There are five rules
that we will go over. I will write them down on the dry erase board while we go
over them.
First: pick out the important details
Second: pick out the details that are repeated or not important and get rid of
them
Third: use key words to highlight important details
Fourth: list the words in order as they appear in the passage
Fifth: Trim the list of key words to make a topic sentence and a couple of
supporting sentences to create your summary. A topic sentence introduces the
main idea of the passage and the supporting sentences help support your main
idea.
3. Then we will do a practice/model for how to summarize and how to follow the
steps of summarizing. I will start by reading the article "Firefly" to then
while they listen. After we read we will talk about the story as a class to see
where our reading comprehension is. Then I will model for them how to summarize
the story using highlighter and the dry erase board. I will go through each step
thoroughly. They can help assist and participate while I model the process of
summarization for them. I will have the five step listed so that each student
can see them and they are visible.
4. After we complete the sample article, I will have them work independently
with our next article "African Elephant." I will first give them a quick book
talk about the article. Elephants are very big mammals that live in Africa. Why
do you think they are so large? How do you think an animal that big survives?
Once we go over the article briefly then I will pass out paper, pencils, and
highlighters. Each student will have a copy of the article. While they are
reading I want them to highlight the important details and cross out the not
important details. Then I want them to make a list of phrases and put them in
order. Last step would be to write a summary. The summary should be between 3 to
4 sentences.
5. Each student is to work independently, but they are welcome to ask their
neighbor a question or share something if they are stuck or need some advice.
After they have had time to complete the assignment I want them to turn to their
neighbor and have them read their summary to their neighbor and take turns.
6. Then I will collect everyone's Summary on the article "African Elephant" for
assessment.
Assessment:
I will collect all of the summaries. Then I will have each student come back and
read their summary to me. We will go over their summaries individually.
-Do they have the steps?
-Do they follow them?
-Do they understand the concept?
References:
"African Elephant" by national geographic for kids
http://animals.nationalgeographic.com/animals/mammals/african-elephant/?source=A-to-Z
"Firefly" by national geographic for kids
http://animals.nationalgeographic.com/animals/bugs/firefly/?source=A-to-Z
Emily Young "Sum it up!"
http://www.auburn.edu/academic/education/reading_genie/odysseys/youngrl.html
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