Reading to Learn

Buzzing into Summaries

Reading to Learn Design

Rationale:

Summarizing is a skill beginning readers need to practice in order to be successful in reading. Students must become fluent readers before they develop summarization skills. After readers define the main ideas of a article, they gain experience in reading, writing and research. Throughout this lesson, students will have the opportunity to read through an article to discover the main points. Rehearsal will help students gain experience in summarization.

Materials:

Pencils, Papers, Highlighters, White board, White board markers, Sheet of blank paper for summarizing rules, Sheet of lined paper for summarizing articles, Copies of the article, "New Dolphin Species Discovered in Big City Harbor", Copies of the article, "Honeybee Mystery", Rubric for grading summaries

Procedures:

Say: “Lets learn how to summarize an article! Summarizing can help us understand what we read after we read it. Summarization is picking out information that is the most important from a larger article or source. Lets practice how to summarize two different articles. Determine what the main idea is, what information supports the main idea, and what details we can take out.
Say: “Now we have to learn the rules of summarizing. (Pass out lined paper for summarizing rules). First I am going to write each rule on the white board then you will copy each one onto your paper. When we are done writing down all of the rules, you can refer to your rules sheet while you read the article. “
Say: "The first thing you do after you read an article is remove trivia and redundancies, which is the repeated information. The second step is highlighting the important information. Lastly you create a statement that covers everything the writer is saying about the topic or the main idea. The main idea should be supported by all the details.”
Say: "Now write these steps on the piece of paper I gave each of you. [They can look I wrote on the board we I wrote what I just said] Then, at the bottom the students will write down on their paper some key points to remember in regards to summarizing. For instance, summaries should always be shorter in length than the information you are summarizing.”
Say: “Now I’m going to pass out an article, New Dolphin Species Discovered in Big City Harbor.” Give every student a copy and then give the following book talk, “This article is about a new species of dolphin found in Australia. How do you think this species of dolphin will be different than other dolphins that you have seen?” Give students time to read article.
Say: “Now, pick out any information in the article that is not as important. For example, I don't think we really need to know that Melbourne is the second largest city in Australia. Because it is not important we can cross it out with our pencils. Next, we need to highlight important information in the text. For example, when it says, “The new dolphin has been named the Burrunan dolphin”. Lets highlight the name of the new dolphin. Now, we have to create our topic sentence. So lets think “What is it about? What is the main point? We know that the article is about a new species of dolphin, so maybe our topic sentence could be about that! Now use your topic sentence and the information that you have left to write our summary on your paper and make sure it is in your own words. (Walk around and help with writing.)
Now pass out the article “Honeybee Mystery.” Say: “We’re going to read an article about honeybees! We’re going to all read the first two paragraphs as a class and practice how to summarize before you all try on your own. Lets also review some vocabulary. While you are reading the article remember to highlight the important information with your highlighter, and cross out the unimportant information with your pencil. At the end of each paragraph, write a summary sentence. [Once students finish reading paragraph two, stop them.] Okay, so let’s practice summarizing using the second paragraph” [display on overhead camera]: Bees give us a lot more than delicious honey. They are pollinators—they enable plants to produce the fruits and nuts we enjoy by carrying pollen from one plant or flower to the next. The wind pollinates oats, corn, and wheat, but many other plants (like apple and cherry trees and melon vines) depend on insects, bats, and birds.
Say: “Pollen is a good vocabulary word. What do you think pollen is? (Give a few seconds wait time) Pollen is the yellow powder that plants and flowers have. It is used to help make new flowers. Pollen can make us sneeze in the springtime! Can someone give me a sentence with the word pollen in it? (Wait for response)
Say: “Next we are going to look for the main idea in this sentence. [Ask what students think is the main point.] Great job! The main idea of this sentence is that bees are pollinators. The other information is not important to us right now for summarizing, so we can cross it out. Your sentence should look like this now, but the remaining part of your sentence should be crossed out” [display what it should look like on over head]
Say: “Now, on your lined paper, summarize the main idea. The main idea of this information is that Bees give us a lot more than yummy honey. They are pollinators, they help plants produce the fruits and nuts we enjoy by carrying pollen from one plant or flower to the next.
Say: “Let’s continue to pick out important points in each paragraph of the article. Now continue reading the article by your self this time. Summarize as much as you can, highlighting important parts and marking through unimportant details. I’ll come around and check your work.”
Say: “Once you’ve read the whole article and find the main ideas and details highlighted, write down a one-paragraph brief summary on the article. At the bottom of your article, write five new words you have never seen before you read this article and write their definitions/what you think they mean based on the context within the article. Any questions?

Assessment:

Students will be assessed at the end on how well they did on their summaries. I will use this scoring rubric to grade their summaries for the correct information:

Did the students’ summary …

Begin by getting rid of the insignificant information? Yes/no

Organize items and events together? Yes/no

Select a key topic/overall theme? Yes/no

Select key information from the article? Yes/no

Write a topic sentence that covers everything that is important from the passage of the text? Yes/no

List 5 new vocabulary words/definitions at the end? Yes/no

I will also ask the students a series of comprehension questions to see if they read and understood the article:

What do plants do beside produce honey?

Why do scientists believe bees are dying?

Why do plants produce honey?

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