READING TO LEARN

Summarizing in the Sea

Rationale: Reading is the first step for students to learn new information. In order to become better readers, we must truly understand what we are reading. One way to for beginning readers to improve comprehension is to learn how to summarize. To summarize is to take all of the important details and main ideas out of a text and combine them in a way that explains the story to someone who has not read it. This lesson helps students learn how to find those main ideas and key details in a text by having the teacher model summarization and then by summarizing on their own. After the students learn how to summarize on their own, they will be assessed on their summarization skills through comprehension questions at the end of the lesson.

Materials:

Pencils
Paper
Highlighter
Black colored pencil (or something to mark the passage with)
Dry-erase board, and dry-erase markers
Passage sample on SmartBoard from “National Geographic for Kids: Green Sea Turtle” The first paragraph.
Classroom copies of full article “National Geographic for Kids: Green Sea Turtle”
Assessment Comprehension Questions
Rubric for summarization

Procedures:

1. Say: “Today we are going to talk about summarization. What do you think it means to summarize a story?” [Let students discuss or answer individually.] “To summarize, we take the most important details of a story and put it in our own words. Important details would be things such as main ideas, important characters, settings, or really important things that a character does depending on what you are reading. When you summarize, you are retelling the story or passage but leaving out all of the unimportant details. We usually use summarization with long books and articles; it helps you break it down into something more simple and easy to remember.”

2. Say: “I’ve given you all an article from National Geographic about sea turtles. Green Sea Turtles are one of the most common species of Sea Turtles in the world and there is a lot of really cool things about them that make them special. We’re going to read the first paragraph together, and I’ll show you how to summarize. Then you’ll get to summarize the rest of the article on your own! We’re going to be investigative scientists as we read this article and see what we can learn about sea turtles that we didn’t already know. Follow along with me as I read the first paragraph out loud.” [Read first paragraph aloud.]

3. Say: “Now let’s take a look at my copy of this paragraph on the SmartBoard. Notice how I highlighted important details and crossed out details that were not important. That helps me keep facts straight and the main idea in mind.” [Model sample below on SmartBoard.] “This can help you comprehend, or understand, the most important parts of all sentences you read in any text as well.”

*Example Below

4. Explain: “To review, the main topic or first sentence tells us what the paragraph will be about. Our first sentence talked about how the green sea turtle is the largest species of hard-shelled sea turtles. And then the paragraph tells us about how much they weigh. It’s important for us to know how much they weigh so I highlighted the part of the sentence where it says they weigh 300-400 pounds, but since we don’t need to know the kilogram equivalent of that I crossed that out. That information isn’t necessary for my understanding of the size of green sea turtles. So some information is more important than other information in a paragraph. Being able to identify which information is helpful is going to help you summarize more effectively. I’m going to give you all a chance to try this on your own. Remember that there’s not always a right or wrong answer with what is the most useful information, so just do your best!”

5. Say: “Let’s read more about our friends the Green Sea Turtles. I am also giving you a black colored pencil and a highlighter. As you read, highlight details that you think are important and contribute to the main idea of the story. Take the black colored pencil and cross out the details that you do not think are important like I did above. The main idea of this story is to give you more information on the turtles. There is a lot of information on the turtles, so pick facts that are main ideas. For example, where they live, what they eat, are they endangered, etc.”

6. Say: “Before you read, let’s go over a little vocabulary that you’ll see in the passage so you’ll know what it means.” [Write these on the board as well, with an example sentence so students may refer back.]

(a.) Nesting – when animals lay eggs or give birth to their young; gather nest. An example would be, “While walking along the beach, I came across a mother turtle nesting, getting ready to lay her eggs.”

(b.) Poaching – is when someone hunts or fishes illegally. An example would be, “Even though the tigers are endangered, the men went poaching for the animals to get their soft fur.

[Let students complete their reading and marking of the text.]

7. Say: “When you’ve finished reading and marking the story, I want you to summarize it in 4 sentences or less. Remember to only include main ideas and details. Don’t include any of the details that you crossed out, only the ones that you have highlighted. Write in complete sentences and use correct punctuation. The most important thing is not to copy the text just like it is but put it in your own words, this is summarizing.”

“When you’ve finished reading and summarizing, I want you to come put your papers on the front table. Okay, now let’s get to reading and summarizing.” [Allow 20-25 minutes for students to summarize.]

8. “Once you have completed your summaries, answer the following questions about what you just read. Use complete sentences and accurate punctuation.” [After students turn in their summarizations, hand out the comprehension questions and have them answer those on their own. Grade those for accuracy to assess their comprehension.]

Assessment:

Comprehension Questions:

1. Where can you find Green Sea Turtles?

2. If you were a scientist would you classify Green Sea Turtles as an amphibian, a mammal, or a fish? Support your decision.

3. What are some threats to Green Sea Turtles?

Rubric:

Student Name:

Date:

Student clearly read article all the way through and used information from different paragraphs: ____ / 3

Picked out information using methods taught in class: _____ / 2

Deleted unimportant details: _____ / 1

Wrote a short paragraph summarizing most important details from the article: ____ / 4