Summarize a literary text (including the plot, theme)

Multiple Choice

What is a summary?

• a short explanation of a text
• a persuasive argument about a text
• a movie based off of a book
• a theme or universal lesson

Multiple Choice

You should write your summary

• in your own words with complete sentences
• in a secret language that you make up
• in one draft without revising
• in fragments without punctuation

Multiple Choice

Summarizing is a retelling in your own words, a short version of the main ideas, events and details.

• True
• False

Multiple Choice

When some people think about Texas, they think of cowboys on the open range-herding cattle up a dusty trail. However, Texas has much more than open prairie with large herds of cows. There are the mountains of West Texas, the piney hills of east Texas, and the emerald waters off the coast of Padre Island. Texas also has large coastal harbors with numerous sailboats, powerboats, inland lakes, rivers. The swamps of southeast Texas have alligators and other exotic wildlife.

The Summary of this passage is:

• There are a lot of cows in Texas.

• There are many different, varied parts of Texas.

• Texas is one of the biggest states in the United States.

• There are alligators in the swampland of southeast Texas.

Multiple Choice

Tomorrow is Jill's birthday. She is excited because she gets to pick where she will eat dinner. Will it be Mexican food at the Big Enchilada House? Or will it be fried chicken at the Chicken Shack, or a big cheeseburger at Al's Hamburger Palace. She just couldn't decide. Then there was always the Pizza Shop with that great pepperoni pizza. How would she ever decide? Maybe she would just flip a coin.

The Summary of this passage is:

• Jill has many restaurants to choose from for her birthday.

• Jill loves Mexican food.

• The Pizza Shop has the best pizza in town.

• Jill will choose a place by flipping a coin.

Multiple Choice

It started when they got to the bears. Peter felt tired and his stomach hurt. He dragged himself over to see the elephants, which were eating from a stack of hay. Normally, the elephants were his favorite. Without much interest, Peter followed his classmates to the camels, which were busy swatting flies with their tails. Peter knew he should be having fun at the zoo, but he just felt terrible and all he wanted to do was lie down and rest. Even the lions and tigers did not interest him now.

The Summary of this passage is:

• Peter's favorite animals were the elephants.

• The camels were swatting flies with their tails.

• It was really hot at the zoo.

• Peter didn't enjoy the zoo because he felt really bad.

Multiple Choice

Read the following passage and then answer the question.

As soon as she arrived at grandmother's house, Jessica ran into her bedroom to look at the blue quilt. It covered her grandmother's bed and was Jessica's favorite. It had patches of dark blue, medium blue, and light blue, with pictures of birds and flowers on every other patch. Jessica liked to take naps with the quilt wrapped around her. She loved the way it felt so soft and warm against her skin. Whenever she was visiting grandma, just looking at the quilt made Jessica happy.

• Jessica's grandmother has a pretty blue quilt.

• Jessica loved her grandmother's quilt.

• Jessica took naps at her grandmother's house.

• The quilt was warm.

Multiple Choice

We know that the planets of our solar system orbit the sun. Comets also orbit our sun—more than 4,000 of them. Most comets circle the sun very slowly. While the earth circles the sun once a year, many comets take thousands of years to complete just one orbit of the sun. Comets are made of frozen gasses and bits of rock and dust. The solid part of most comets can be up to 10 miles across. As a comet gets close to the sun, the heat causes the comet’s frozen gasses to turn into a cloud of vapor and dust. The cloud can be thousands of miles across. Solar winds cause this vapor cloud to trail out behind the comet like a tail. This “vapor tail” can be hundreds of millions of miles long. Sometimes comets are visible from earth. You might think that when this happens you would see the comet whizzing across the sky. But in fact, it would appear to be motionless. This is because both the comet and the earth are moving. The most famous comet is Halley’s Comet. Its orbit around the sun takes 76 years. This is pretty fast for a comet. There are records of sightings of Halley’s Comet from 2,500 years ago. The next time it will be visible from earth will be in 2061.

Summarize the actions the Mother Crab takes to demonstrate walking straight. What do her attempts indicate about her understanding of her own advice?

• The Mother Crab tells her son that walking straight forward would be better. This reveals that she is critical or judgmental of her son's natural way of moving.

• The Mother Crab tries repeatedly to walk straight but fails, indicating that she does not fully understand or practice what she preaches.

• The Mother Crab learns that she should not criticize her son for something she cannot do herself, connecting to the idea that one must practice what they preach.

• The Young Crab asks his mother to show him how to walk straight, indicating he is open to learning and values her guidance.