Circle One and Underline a Few

Circle One and Underline a Few

Introduction to Focusing Your Ideas for Writing

What is "Circle One and Underline a Few?"

• It's a method to pick your main idea and important details.

• It helps you to organize your thoughts before writing

Elaborations are also known as key details and textual evidence. They are facts that support the main idea of the paragraph.

Elaborations

Main ideas are also known as central ideas. You can circle a part of the first sentence that lets you know what that paragraph will be all about.

Main Ideas

Types of Evidence

Underline the parts of the paragraph that elaborate on the main idea. Underline sparingly. You do not have to underline complete sentences.

Underline

Circle part of the sentence that has the main idea in it. It is usually the first sentence.

Circle

Annotating for the Main Idea and Its Elaborations

Hotspot

Where is the main idea?

Hotspot

Where is the third elaboration?