Rationale: Reading is a very important aspect of learning. In order to really comprehend long texts, students need to practice their abilities to summarize. Readers need to be able to differentiate between important information in a text and less important details. This is important for recalling the main ideas of passages. The goal of this lesson is to teach students how to pick out important information in a text, summarize the text, and then demonstrate their understanding of the text. They will do this by reading two short articles, picking out the important information, deleting the trivial information, and writing a summary. While teaching this lesson, it's important to keep in mind the heart of summarization which is subordinating predicate-terms. Subordinating predicate, in other terms, means finding an umbrella term for the events that happen in the text.

 

Materials:

• Smart board/white board

• Highlighters for students

• Pencils for students

• Copy of African Elephant article for each student

• Copy of Gecko article for each student

• Paper for students

• Assessment Summary Checklist for each student (for teacher use)

 

Procedures:

1. Say: “Today we are going to learn about summarization. Does anybody know what summarization means?” Allow students a few seconds to answer. “Good! Summarization means reading a text and then picking out the most important details. Then, you put those details into your own words. What kinds of details can be important?” Allow students time to answer. “Right! Some examples of important details are main characters, important events, setting, topics, etc. When we summarize, we can leave out unimportant details that do not really matter in the text. When we read long texts, we can summarize so that it is simpler and easier to remember. Today we are going to practicing summarizing with animal articles.”

 

2. Say: “Let’s learn some good tips for summarizing. I am going to write each tip on the board. Take out a piece of paper and write down the tips too so you can look at them when you need them.” Write rules on the board. Read them as you right them. 

 

-Tip 1: Read the text carefully.

-Tip 2: Find the main idea

-Tip 3: Use a pencil or highlighter to mark any important points/details

-Tip 4: Cross out any details that are not important or relevant

-Tip 5: Organize your important points/details into sentences.

 

 *“Now remember that your summarization should always be shorter than the actual text.”*

 

3. Say: “Can anyone tell me anything they know about elephants?” Give students a few minutes to share any information that they know. “Great! Well, today we are going to learn even more and read an article about elephants. Elephants are very common in Africa, where it is hot and filled with many wild animals. African elephants range throughout the savannas of sub-Saharan Africa and the rainforests of central and West Africa. They eat a lot of crops because they have such big appetites. Has anyone ever seen an elephant before?” Allow students time to answer if they had ever seen an elephant and share what they were like. Pass out article about the African Elephant to students. “This article talks about what African Elephants look like, what they do, where they live, etc. Now, we are going to read this article together as group. We will highlight and/or underline anything that we think is important as we go along. We will also cross out any details that are not super important. Then, we will organize what we have highlighted/underlined into sentences to create our summary.”

 

4. Read the article out loud to the class, while having them follow along. Stop after every paragraph to mark any important details by highlighting/underlining. Cross out any information that does not seem necessary. Go over any vocabulary words that they do not know (ex: “Does anybody know what the word elongated means?" Give students time to think of definition. Elongated means that something can stretch out very long. This word can be used to describe the trunk of the elephant! Here’s an example of the word in a sentence. She elongated her legs so that they could reach the ceiling. Would somebody else like to try to use elongated in a sentence?” Allow students time to think, and then take 1 or 2 volunteers to share their sentences.) Let's look at the first two paragraphs. What is an important word, or main idea, in the first paragraph? The first paragraph/section talks about how the elephants use their trunks. That is our main idea. So all of our important information will be about the survival skills of an elephant using their trunks. What is something important that is says about how they survive in the heat? Yes, they get in the water while using their trunks as a snorkel! How else do they use their trunks? Yes, they use their trunks to pick greenery for them to eat. What does the next paragraph talk about? What is the key umbrella term, or main idea? Yes, the main idea is social interaction. So, everything important in this paragraph will be about social interaction. Is it important that the baby elephants suck their trunks like human babies suck their thumb? No, this does not have anything to do with social interaction, so this is trivial information, so we can cross it out. How do elephants show affection to one another? Yes, they hug their trunks together sometimes. This is important and it has to do with social interaction, so we will highlight this. How do the elephants help one another? Sometimes they use their trunks to help baby calves or other elephants in a tough situation or obstacle. They could be stuck in the mud or a baby calf could need help standing up. This is all important information that has to do with the main idea of the paragraph- social interaction. Therefore, we will highlight this information, and cross out the information that is not as important." Below is an example of the highlighted text for the first two paragraphs. 

 

-“Elephants are social creatures. They sometimes hug by wrapping their trunks together in displays of greeting and affection.”
 

-“Elephants also use their trunks to help lift or nudge an elephant calf over an obstacle, to rescue a fellow elephant stuck in mud, or to gently raise a newborn elephant to its feet.”

 

-“Adult females and young travel in herds, while adult males generally travel alone or in groups of their own.”

 

5. Discuss the rest of the article with the students, going over the main ideas. “What is the main topic of this article? Right, it’s about African Elephants. I would like for you all to write 4 or 5 sentences that summarize the article. The main idea of the article should be your topic sentence (ex. African Elephants are mammals that live in the heat of Africa.).” Give students time to write down their summaries on a piece of paper. “Let’s go over some of the things you wrote.” Call on students to read off one of their sentences. Write their sentences on the board. This way, you are creating a summary with the class. “Good job class! We just wrote a summary!” Below is an example summary. 

 

“African Elephants are mammals that live in the heat of Africa. They use their trunks to do a lot of things for themselves. When it comes to spending time with one another, they even use their trunks to hug and help one another in times of struggle. When traveling, adult females travel with their babies while adult males travel by themselves or with the other adult males.”

 

6.“Now I am going to let you write a summary on your own. I will give you another article to read.” Hand out the Gecko Article. “This article is about an reptilian animal called a Gecko. This article describes what Geckos do, where they live, what they look like, etc. Has anybody ever seen a Gecko? Can you share with the class what they were like?" Allow students time to share with the class. "Some people say that they wish they were Geckos so they could camouflage themselves. Would you all like to camouflage yourself? Remember to highlight any main points and cross out anything that is not important that may become distracting. After you read the article, write 4 or 5 sentences to summarize.” Walk around to monitor students and help any that may need your assistance. Take up their summaries and articles when they are done. This is their assessment.

 

Comprehension Questions:

​

1. What are the kinds of settings African Elephants live in? (answer: Savanna and Rainforests)

2. How do they use their trunks when trying to cool off from the heat? (answer: by going underwater while lifting their trunks out like a snorkel. they can breathe while cooling off under the water.)

3. How do African Elephants show affection? (answer: by wrapping their trunk around another’s trunk)

4. What kinds of foods do African Elephants eat? (answer: greenery, plants, crops)

5. What kind of weather conditions do African Elephants live in? (answer: summer, heat, hot)

​

Assessment:

When summarizing, did the student…?

 

1. Underline/highlight important information    YES/NO

2. Cross out unimportant information                YES/NO

3. Find main idea or topic                                  YES/NO

4. Write a summary (4 to 5 sentences)              YES/NO

 

Resources: 

African Article: “African Elephant.” National Geographic Kids. 2017. https://kids.nationalgeographic.com/animals/mammals/african-elephant/

 

Gecko Article: “Gecko.” National Geographic Kids. 2017. https://kids.nationalgeographic.com/animals/reptiles/gecko/

​

Ashley Kirkland, "Swimming into Summarization"

https://abk0020.wixsite.com/reading/reading-to-learn

​

Click here to return to Reading Genie Developmental Index Page