Hopping into Summarizing | Ms.Boyd'sBrainyBits

Hopping Into Summarizing

Reading to Learn Design by Logan Boyd

Rationale:

The goal of reading fluently is to make the bridge between word recognition and comprehension. When students can fluently read, they are capable of summarizing texts, which is one of the most important skills for comprehending a text. In this lesson, students will learn to point out the most important pieces of information from a text in order to summarize. In this lesson, students will read the article “Frog Facts for kids” and ask themselves “What is the author telling me in this article?”. By doing this, students are using tools to learn to summarize key points from the text in their own words.

Materials:

Frog facts for kids article
Pencil and paper
Dry erase board and markers
Summarization checklist
Comprehension quiz

Procedures:

“Has there every been a time that you have had something exciting happen or read a good story and you wanted to tell someone about it? But you did not tell them every detail of that story, right? You told them the important parts so that they would see the big picture. That is a strategy called summarizing. When we summarize, we take a story or passage that we know and condense it into only the things we need to know.”
“Now we are going to practice a summarizing strategy known as about-point. How we do this is by asking ourselves two questions after we read a passage. Our first question can be answered quickly and easily, ‘What is this story about?’ The other is a little more difficult, ‘What point is the author trying to make?” Write these on the white board. “We will use our answers to compose a topic sentence. The word we use to describe the important part that the author is trying to talk about is the umbrella term.”
“Can anyone tell me something interesting about a frog?” Wait for responses. “Frogs begin their lives as tadpoles in the water and then grow into frogs that live in trees and many other places.” “Today we are going to read an article about frogs to help us work on our summarization skills.”
“Before we take a look at our article, let’s look at a vocabulary word to make sure we know what it means for better comprehension of our text. The article tells us that frogs are amphibians. An amphibian is a cold-blooded animal that starts off as a gill-breathing animal, but as an adult grows to use its lungs to breathe. What other animals would be considered amphibians?” Wait for responses. “Another example could be a toad, so how can we make a sentence with that knowledge using the word amphibian?” Wait for responses. “That’s right! Toads are amphibians, which are animals that start off breathing with gills and as adults grow to breathe with their lungs.”
“Let’s take a look at our article together and I will show you how to summarize. ‘Many frogs are semi-aquatic. They may live on both land and in water, and in any event prefer damp places. These include ponds, swamps, rivers and lakes. Most adults live where they grew up.’ What does this paragraph talk about? This paragraph talks about frogs living in diverse places. Why is this an important characteristic of a frog’s life?” Wait for responses. “That’s right! Frogs can live on land and in water because they are semi-aquatic! Now, we can combine these points to make a topic sentence for the paragraph, ‘Frogs live in diverse places because they are semi-aquatic, meaning they can live on both land and in water.”
“Okay, now it’s your turn to try to summarize this ‘Frogs are cold blooded animals. This means that they need heat to keep up their body temperature. If the temperature outside is cold, amphibians will not be active. Amphibians can get heat from the sun, usually indirectly: whereas reptiles can bask in the sun, amphibia usually do not, because it dries their skin.’ What was this paragraph about?” Wait for responses. “That’s correct, frogs are cold blooded animals! What point do you think the author was trying to make?” Wait for responses. “Good answer. Frogs are amphibians, so they get heat from the sun indirectly. So now we put the two ideas together to make a topic sentence, Frogs are cold-blooded because they are amphibians, which means they get heat from the sun indirectly.”
“Now I want you all to use the about-point method to summarize each paragraph. Make sure to summarize using your own words, not copying the article. Come turn in your sentences to me when you have completed them and grab a quiz.”
I will read each students page of topic sentences, using the checklist, to see if they can correctly summarize.