Summarize with Big Red Eyes
Rationale:
When
students learn to read, it is very important to also teach
comprehension, so students can understand and recall the information
read in any text. There are several comprehension strategies
students can learn to help them understand this process. One
strategy, summarization, helps students find and remember the most
important information in a text through a series of five steps: delete
unimportant information, delete repeated information, substitute easy
terms for lists of items, substitute a series of events with one easy
action term, and select or invent a topic sentence. This lesson
will teach students how to summarize their reading with the help of
these steps. Once students learn how to use these steps, they
will be able to summarize any text.
Materials:
Whiteboard; overhead projector; Copy of
Red-Eyed Tree Frogs from National Geographic Kid (copies for
each child); Copy of Turtle Travels from National Geographic
Kid News (copies for each child); Highlighters for teacher and each
student; Paper; Pencils; and Checklist.
Procedure:
1.
The teacher will begin the lesson by reviewing how to
read silently. Say, "Can anyone tell me what it means to read
silently? Very good, it is when we read the words with our eyes
without saying anything with our mouths. Now, here's a harder
question. Why is it good for us to read silently? That's
right; it helps us remember what we read. Today we are going to
practice reading silently and learn how to summarize what we read, so
we comprehend the text we read."
2.
The teacher will discuss what it means to summarize a
story and the steps it takes to create a summary. Say, "Who can
tell me what it means to summarize a story? (Allow time for the
students to respond.) When we summarize a story it means we give
a shorter version of the story that only tells the most important parts
of the story. There are five steps for us to follow when we are
summarizing a story. I will explain the steps and then you can
practice summarizing on your own." The teacher will then explain the 5
basic steps to the students and write them on the board so they can
refer back to them. "These are the five steps that will help us
summarize information we read: first we get rid of any
unimportant information, then we delete repeated information,
substitute easy terms for lists of items, substitute a series of events
with one action term that can be easily remembered, and finally we
select or create a topic sentence."
3.
Say, "Now each of you is going to get a copy of a
passage entitled Red- Eyed Tree Frog. The article is
about a certain type of frog that lives in the tree.
It's green with big red eyes and red feet and can hide itself
from its predators. How do you think a tree frog might hide itself when
it is in danger? We will have to read this article to find out
all about the tree frog. First, I want each of you to read the
article silently. When you are done with the reading, close your
packet and turn it over so I know you are finished reading."
4.
"We are going to read another article in a few minutes,
but right now I am going to show you how to use these five steps in
order to create a summary of what we just read." (Put the passage
on the overhead projector. Open it to the first page) "I am going to
read the first page out loud and as I read I am going to highlight the
most important information. Then, I am going to come up with a
summary incorporating the rest of the steps." (Model how to
create a summary of the first page and discuss in detail how you came
up with your summary. Say, "The passage begins with a description
of the brain and its jobs. I will highlight the section that
tells how much the brain weighs and what the brain allows us to
do. We want to highlight the parts we want to remember and what
is interesting." The teacher will continue to demonstrate how to
summarize the first page of the article.)
5.
Give each student a highlighter. Say, "Now you
are going to summarize the rest of the article. I want you to
highlight the important information like I did and be sure to use all
five steps to create your summary. When you are finished
highlighting, write your summary on a piece of paper." (While the
students are working, the teacher should walk around and guide
them. When everyone is finished, discuss what the students came
up with and how they used the five steps to develop their summary.)
Assessment:
Pass out the
second article to the students and provide a book talk ("This next
article is about turtles and how they are born. Did you know that
turtles come from eggs? We will have to read the article to find
out all about the birth and early life of a turtle.") Have the
students read the entire second article silently. The students
will then write a summary based on the five steps after they have
finished reading. The students will turn in their summary and the
teacher will use a checklist to decide whether or not they used the
five steps in the summarizing process.
References:
Hughes, Catherine D.
Red-Eyed Tree Frogs. National Geographic Kids.
November 25, 2007.
http://kids.nationalgeographic.com/Animals/CreatureFeature/Red-eyed-tree-frogs?vgnextfmt=printable
Miller, Gary.
Turtle Travels. April 2010.
http://magma.nationalgeographic.com/ngexplorer/1004/articles/mainarticle.html
Ward, Jenna. Chunks, Chunks and more Chunks.
http://www.auburn.edu/academic/education/reading_genie/constr/wardrl.html