Summarizing Texts

Students will be summarizing literary text during the next story cycle. They will read a legend, a realistic fiction story, and a poem, fairy tale, tall tale, and fable.

When you summarize you tell the main events or ideas in your own words. You leave out all the smaller, unimportant details, and focus on the main points. When summarizing literary texts you include important events from the beginning, middle, and end of the text. Remember that a summary should be much shorter than the text itself. Look at the example of the organizer below to see how we can summarize a legend.

Beginning

Middle

End

· Possum liked to sing about his bushy tail.

· Rabbit got jealous because he had no tail and decided to trick Possum.

· Rabbit asked Possum if he was going to the meeting and dance.

· Possum wanted everyone to be able to see his tail.

· Rabbit sent Cricket to prepare Possum’s tail.

· Rabbit gave Cricket instructions on what to do to Cricket’s tail.

· Possum thought Cricket was making his tail beautiful.

· Cricket wrapped Possum’s tail in a ribbon so he couldn’t see what he was doing.

· Possum untied the ribbon so everyone could see his tail at the dance.

· Everyone laughed.

· Possum was so embarrassed he fell to the ground and played dead.

· This is why Possum’s tail is bare to this day and he plays dead whenever he is surprised.

Did you include the problem and the solution?

Possum liked to sing about his bushy tail. Since Rabbit didn’t have a tail he got jealous and decided to trick Possum. Rabbit told Possum about a meeting and dance. Possum wanted to go to show everyone his tail. Rabbit sent Cricket to prepare Possum’s tail but he had given secret instructions to Cricket. Possum thought Cricket was making his tail beautiful, but Cricket was really cutting the hair off his tail and hiding what he did under a ribbon. At the dance Possum untied the ribbon and everyone laughed. Possum was so embarrassed he fell to the ground and played dead. This is why Possum’s tail is bare to this day and he plays dead whenever he is surprised.

Summarizing Literary Text – This week’s spelling words focus on silent letters in words.
comb	knife	hour	island
gnaw	lamb	wrinkle	sword
chord	doubt	wreck	listen
knee	knock	castle	Wednesday

After summarizing literary texts, students will focus on summarizing informational texts using various articles.

There is a difference between summarizing literary and informational texts. When summarizing informational texts students give the main idea and one or two supporting details from each section of the text. Look at the example of the organizer below to see how we would summarize the article "Sea Turtle Rescue":

Main Idea(s) From Portion

Introduction:

Kids in Mafia Island helped raise community awareness about why sea turtles are important.

“Sea Life Needs Sea Turtles”

Sea turtles play a key role in Mafia Island’s chain of life.

“Kids Teach, Adults Learn”

Dr. Muir set up an educational program about sea turtles and got kids and fishermen involved.

“Success Saving Sea Turtles”

The program seems to have succeeded.

Detail #1

Fishermen sold sea turtles for their meat.

Detail #1

Sea grass beds need sea turtles to graze on them in order to stay healthy.

Detail #1

Teenagers held competitions to teach adults about turtles.

Detail #1

Killing turtles and taking their eggs almost completely stopped.

Detail #2

A fisherman spared the life of a sea turtle because of the efforts of the kids.

Detail #2

Four of the world’s five sea turtles swim in the waters off Mafia.

Detail #2

Fishermen who guard nests and turn over live sea turtles get paid.

Detail #2

Did you remember to include main ideas from all portions of the text?

Summarizing Informational Texts – This week our spelling words focus on the /j/ sound in words.
age	bridge	join	jolly
page	judge	gym	jeans
magic	danger	jumped	tragic
stranger	large	edge	gentle