Summarizing an article

What is a summary?

• Brief statement/paragraph that includes the important information from a text

• Supporting Details with examples

• Random information thrown together

• Main Idea

Right now Jason was playing right field. He really wanted to play third base. Earlier this year, coach had put him in left field and second base in a game, but never at third base. Once in practice, coach let him play third base, but he kept missing ground balls. When he did stop one, he made a bad throw to first base. Maybe if he kept practicing, Jason would be good enough to play third base. That was his dream.
The Summary of this passage is:

• Jason really wanted to play third base.
• Jason was the best player on his team.
• Jason had trouble catching ground balls.
• Jason was too lazy to practice.

San Francisco is located on the coast of California in an area often called the Bay Area. The weather is generally very mild, seldom getting really cold or really hot. Its mild climate is one reason many people live there. It seldom snows in San Francisco and generally does not get below freezing during the winter. Even in the middle of summer, temperatures may be in the mid 80s with a cool breeze from the bay keeping the weather very comfortable.
The Summary of this passage is:
 

• San Francisco has many neat things to do.
•  It seldom snows in California.
•  Many people choose to live in California.
•  The weather in San Francisco is generally very mild.

Read the following passage and then answer the question.
Math didn't make much sense to Cathy. She always got area and perimeter mixed up and she had no idea what a right angle was. Last quarter she failed math, and this quarter wasn't any better. As long as she could remember, math had been hard for Cathy. She did fine in reading and science, but not math. Now she was working on her math homework, but she didn't know how to do most of it. Who invented math, anyway!

• Who invented math?
• Cathy did well in reading and science.
• Cathy always got area and perimeter mixed up.
• Cathy was not very good at math.

Read the following passage and then answer the question.
The Elk River flows from the far northern part of the state all the way to the southern tip. All kinds of animals rely on it for drinking water, people eat the fish they catch in it, and farmers in the state depend on it for irrigating their crops. Since there is very little rain in this state, the Elk River gives animals and humans the water they need to stay alive. Even though the river is not nearly the biggest in the nation, it is very important to the people and animals that live near it.

• The Elk River is a small river.
• The Elk River starts in the northern part of the state.
• The Elk River is very important to people and animals.
• People catch fish in the Elk River.

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.