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The Summarization Station

Next Stop- Reading to Learn

By: Kristen Hall

 

Rationale: Once students have mastered reading accurately and fluently, they are ready to take the next step in reading. The ultimate goal of reading is comprehension followed by reading to learn. This lesson focuses on the strategy of summarization that helps students learn to summarize by teaching them how to delete trivial and unnecessary information, in order to focus on the important parts of text.

 

Materials:

• The article Super Cute Mammal Rediscovered from National Geographic Kids. (One per student)

• The article Sloth from National Geographic Kids. (one per student)

• Pencils, paper, and highlighters. (one or two per student)

• Assessment checklist and comprehension questions.

 

Procedures:

 

1. Say: Today we are going to learn how to find the main ideas in text. This process of weeding out unnecessary information is called summarization. We need to use summarization when we read to check and make sure we comprehend the story. Does anyone know what comprehend means? Comprehend means that you understand what is happening in the story you are reading. Summarization is one of the steps that helps us understand the text.

 

2. Say: Let’s review some steps that will help us summarize our text. First, we need to mark out unimportant information that is not repeated in the text. Next, we need to find and highlight important information. You can spot the important ideas by looking for facts that relate to the topic of the text you are reading. Lastly, we need to form a topic sentence from the important information.

 

3. Pass out Super Cute Mammal Rediscovered and say: Now I’m going to model how to use the these steps to summarize text.

For example:

 

“For more than 20 years, the Ili pika—a type of tiny, mountain-dwelling mammal with a teddy bear face—eluded           scientists in the mountains of northwestern China. People had seen the furry critter only a handful of times in the first few years after its discovery in 1983, and then the trail went cold. But in the summer of 2014, researchers rediscovered the pika” (Arnold, 2015). 

           

First, we need to mark out unimportant information. So I would ask myself what unnecessary information do I see? Well this passage never talks about what the Ili pika looks like again so I know this information is unnecessary and that I need to mark out “a type of tiny, mountain-dwelling mammal with a teddy bear face.” I can also mark out “and then the trail went cold.” Next, we need to find and highlight important information. So what important facts do I see about the Ili pika? Well I know that the passage keeps mentioning people not seeing the Ili pika so I need to highlight “For more than 20 years, the Ili pika…eluded scientists.” Do you know what eluded means? Elude means to escape or run away from something usually by trickery. To elude something  you don’t invite someone over to hangout. What else from the passage tells me that the Ili pika did not like to be around people? Right! I need to highlight, “People had only seen the furry critter only a handful of times… after its discovery in 1983.” I can also highlight “…in the summer of 2014, researchers rediscovered the pika.” Now I need to form a topic sentence from the important information. I am going to use my highlighted information to form my topic sentence. My topic sentence might say something like this: “For more than 20 years, the Ili pika eluded scientists and people until it was recently rediscovered.”

 

4. Say: Now that you understand the steps to summarizing text let’s practice them by reading another article. This article is about an interesting animal that sleeps for most of its life. Can you guess what animal I’m talking about? The animal is the sloth! But before we dive into the text let’s review the vocabulary words sluggish, drowsy, avoid, descend, vertebrae, and predator.

 

5. To review the vocabulary explain what it means using a student-friendly definition,, model how to use it in a sentence, ask sample questions for using the word, and scaffold the students in making a sentence with the word. Example: “Our first word is ‘sluggish.’ Sluggish means slow moving or inactive. It doesn’t mean to be fast or energetic. An example is, “The game picked up after its sluggish start.” Now you get a chance to make a sentence using the word. “If you feel overly tired or sluggish you may…” (let students answer) “be getting sick, want to take a nap, not want to play a game, etc.”

 

6. Now have students practice summarizing by reading the article Sloth from National Geographic Kids. Give every student a copy and then give an engaging book talk. Say: This article is about the sleepy, sluggish sloth. This animal is so lazy it sleeps up to twenty hours a day! That’s more than my cat sleeps, and he sleeps quite a bit! How do you think this sleepy animal escapes from dangerous predators that might try to eat him? We’ll have to read to find out! Remember your vocabulary words for this article are: sluggish, drowsy, avoid, descend, vertebrae, and predator. While you are reading the article remember to highlight the important information, and cross out the unimportant information. After each paragraph, write a summary sentence asking yourself the questions: What’s the big idea? What’s the point?”

 

Assessment: When students are finished collect their sentences and grade using this checklist:

• Marked out unimportant or repeated information? Y/N

• Highlighted important information? Y/N

• Reduced text to a few words or phrases? Y/N

• Wrote a simple topic sentence summarizing the article? Y/N

 

Ask students these comprehension questions:

• How do sloth’s spend most of their time?

• Why does algae grow on a sloth’s fur?

• Why do scientist think sloths developed such a slow-moving lifestyle?

• How does the sloth’s sluggish pace help him avoid predators?   

 

Reference:

 

National Geographic Kids. Arnold, Carrie. "Super Cute Mammal Rediscovered."

http://kids.nationalgeographic.com/explore/nature/supercute-mammal-rediscovered/

 

National Geographic Kids. "Sloth."

http://kids.nationalgeographic.com/animals/sloth/

 

“Sum, Sum, Sum It Up!” Caroline Brennan.

https://sites.google.com/site/carolinesexcitinglessons/home/sum-sum-sum-it-up