Rationale:
To be able to read and recall information from an
expository text, children need instruction in summarization. By
deleting
trivial information, deleting redundant information, substituting
super-ordinate terms for a list of items, and creating a topic
sentence,
students will be able to remember factual information better.
Materials:
Dare to Dream: Four True Life Stories About
Imagination by Edgar, Kathleen; Edgar, Susan; and Rinaldo, Denise,
Thompson
Publishing copies of pages 13-17 (the chapter on Dr. Seuss) copies of pages 7-11 (Amanda Dunbar chapter)
with summary missing.
Procedures:
Introduce the
lesson by explaining that sometimes we do not need to always read a
whole
article. Sometimes people summarize articles so we get the main
idea
without reading trivial information.
"Students, sometimes we get articles to read that
are
really long and filled with information we do not need. Today, we
are
going to find a way to delete all this information and sum up the main
points."
To start out with, have the children read the Amanda Dunbar article
with the
missing summary.
"Now that you’ve read the article, do you think
there
is any information we could have deleted? There are three things
that we need
to do in order to summarize this article. First of all, we need
to delete
all the information that we do not need. Next, we will substitute
the
basic terms for a list of items. Finally, we will come up with a
topic
sentence."
"In the article, it says that Dr. Seuss’ father
worked
at the zoo. Do you think that this is important or not? Why
is
that? Yes, I agree that it is important, because he liked writing
about
animals. Do you think we need to include when he was born and
where?
Yes, I agree because we need to learn the basic information. What
kind of
topic sentence should we write?"
Continue
to model which sentences we could delete.
Read
the
summary and ask the children which one they prefer.
Next,
have
the children divide into groups. Each child reads the Dr. Seuss
article.
As a group, they pick a topic sentence, etc. and come up with a
summary.
Each group will have to come to an agreement on their summary.
Then, I
will read my summary and they will make sure theirs includes important
information. I will also explain how summaries are not supposed
to be the
exact same. The children will also be told before starting the
practice
that summarization is NOT copying; it’s putting it in your own
words.
Remind them that silent reading is to you and NOT out loud.
Assessment:
To
assess the students, check the group summaries. Also, listen in
on the
groups and check that they are hitting all three points of
summarization.
References:
Pressley,
Michael, et. Al. The Elementary School Journal, "Strategies
that
Improve Children’s Memory and Comprehension of Text." Volume 90,
Number 1. 1989;
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