Sum it All Up!
Rationale:
Comprehension
is a very important part of reading
successfully. Summarization helps children build their
comprehension
skills. Children should be able to pick out the important parts
of the
text each time they read. There are several strategies that help
students
comprehend reading material. These strategies include pick out
important
ideas, eliminate less important details, and organize the important
ideas into
one main idea. In
this lesson, students will learn about how
they can use these strategies to comprehend reading in articles, books,
and
other print.
Materials:
--
Paper
and pencils for
each student
-
Dry
erase board and dry erase markers (or
chalkboard and chalk)
--
Colored
pencils
-
Poster
with three summarization techniques
(Pick out important ideas; Eliminate less important details; Organize
the
important ideas into one main idea)
-- Article for each child
-Orcas
(Killer Whales)
-- Poster with paragraph: There are
millions of bugs in the world. Different bugs live in different
climates and places. My favorite bug is
the beetle.
http://kids.nationalgeographic.com
Procedure:
1.
Ask
the children, “Does
anyone know what summarization is?” Discuss summarization as a
class. “Summarization is picking out the important facts out of a
book or
passage that you are reading. When you summarize, you don’t focus
on all
the details. You just focus on the most important details. I would
like
everyone to pay close attention because today, we’re going to learn how
to
summarize. Summarizing will help you become better readers, and
good
readers summarize so they can comprehend what they are
reading. First, we’re
going to read silently at our desks. Can anyone tell me how we
read
silently at our desks? You got it! We read to ourselves,
and we don’t
talk to anyone around us.”
2.
“There
are three steps
to summarizing a story.” Read the students a short paragraph of
the
article and model how to summarize it. For example, the article
Grossology.
(http://www.nationalgeographic.com/ngkids/0204/ws_main.html)
Point
to the poster with the summarization techniques on it. “Before we
begin
reading, let’s go over the three important things to remember when you
read. The first step is to pick out important ideas from the
story. Let's look at this paragraph for example.Make sure you pick out
the most important ideas! ( Ex.
Look, I
think this is a very important idea, it tells us an estimate of all the
different kinds of bugs in the world.) Then we throw away the details
that are
not important. (Ex. I don’t think this one is too important because it
says the
beetle is the writer’s favorite bug. That doesn’t really tell us
something
important about bugs, does it? I didn’t think so either. Let’s mark
that out.)
Last we organize the important ideas and make one main idea of the
story.”
(Ex. There are many different kinds of
bugs in the world. Different bugs live in different places. Etc.)
3.
Has anyone ever heard of
Orcas, or Killer Whales? Where do they live? Do you think that they are
real killers? Let's read and find out about Killer Whales. Pass
out and introduce
the article to each student. I would like everyone to read the first
paragraph
of this article it’s called Orcas-Killer Whales. I will know when you
are
finished because all eyes will be on me. Have students read silently
through
the first paragraph of the article before focusing on the summarization
techniques. Go over the summarization techniques again, and then
have the
students reread the first paragraph of the article. Who can tell me
some important ideas here? Great, we should keep those. Tell
them,
“Now, when
you read the story the second time, cross out all the information that
isn’t
important to the story with a pencil, circle the sentences that you
think are
important and then finally, take all the circled sentences and combine
them
into a sentence or two that summarizes the whole article.” Which
sentences did you mark out? I do not think those were too important
either. (It
would be
helpful to write this information on the dry erase/chalk board.)
Encourage
students to really keep in mind the three summarization
techniques. Have
students write down the facts that they think are important.
Model three
facts that you (teacher) think are important after they read theirs
aloud. This will help students understand what they should do
later.
4.
Now,
the
students should have a basic understanding of how to summarize a story
since
they have had practice. Pass out a piece of paper to each
student.
Tell them to make three columns. In the first column, they should
put “Deleted
Information.” In the second column, they should put “Important
Facts.”
In the third column, they should put “Most Important Ideas.”
Explain to
them to fill in information from the story into the three
columns. Model
using the first paragraph again. This is a great way to scaffold
for the
students. If a student continues to have problems putting the
information
into the columns on paper, allow them to continue using cross
out/circle
method. “Please finish reading your article silently. You should
have
three columns on your paper, write the sentences in the column that
they fit
under as you read the article, if it helps continue to cross out
unimportant
information and circle important stuff. Remember to write down all of
your
information as you go.”
5.
Continue
to
practice summarization strategies so that students can successfully
master the
skill of summarizing.
Assessment:
You
can check students’ summarization skills by asking comprehension
questions from the article. For example, what did the Killer
Whales eat? Where do they live?
References:
Let’s
Summarize- Jane Moncrief http://www.auburn.edu/academic/education/reading_genie/invent/moncriefrl.html.
www.nationalgeographic.com
http://www.kids.nationalgeographic.com/orcas
http://www.kids.nationalgeographic.com/ngkids/0204/ws_main.html
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