Summary and Close Reading

What is a summary?

• A restatement of a piece of writing that is both brief and written in your own words
• One long quote that uses all of the author's words exactly
• The reader's personal thoughts and opinions about the article and the author
• Just putting the main idea of an article into your own words

When writing a summary, what type of information do you want to use for the supporting details?

• All of the information that the article gives
• Only the important information or key details that the article gives
• Only the extra information or "fluff" that the article gives
• Whatever facts the reader thinks are most interesting

Why do we number our paragraphs before reading a new article?

• Because we have to write a different summary for each paragraph
• Because we need to know how many total paragraphs are in an article
• Because it helps us pin-point key details
• Because it makes the article look nicer

What should you be doing during your "First Reading" of a new article?

• Trying to understand what the article is about in general
• Looking for all of the key details
• Writing your main idea sentence
• Reading the article as fast as possible to get to the second reading

What strategy do we use to help us produce the main idea of an article?

• Compare and Contrast
• Process of Elimination
• Trial and Error
• Identify + Verb + Topic + Finish the Thought (I+V+T+F)

What should you be doing during your "Second Reading" of a new article?

• Looking for the main idea using the I+V+T+F strategy
• Underlining new thoughts that will become the supporting details
• Numbering your paragraphs
• Looking for the topic of the article, the who or what the article is about

What information will you plug into your graphic organizer?

• The main idea and supporting details of the article
• Just the main idea of the article
• Just the supporting details of the article
• The main idea, supporting details, and your thoughts on the article

What format will your final product be in?

• Written in a graphic organizer
• Written in a paragraph
• Written in one sentence
• Written to match the length of the article 

What is close reading?

• Reading the text with your face as close to the paper as possible
• Reading the text without making any marks or notes on it
• Reading the text once and as quickly as possible
• Reading a text carefully to both understand it and answer questions about it

What do we use to help us form conclusions about difficult words or ideas?

• Context Clues
• Main Idea
• Supporting Details
• I+V+T+F