Summarizing a Passage

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.

Which best describes a summary?

• a really long detailed piece of writing

• the entire text told in your own words

• a dumb thing that teachers make you write

• the main ideas and important details of a text

What is the first step to summarizing a passage?

• Carefully reading through and understanding the passage so you can make a better summary.

• Put the first important thing you see down without even reading the passage.

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

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.

When would you most likely summarize a book?

• when you want to forget a book you've read

• when you want to tell a friend your opinion of a book but not what it was about

• when you want to tell a friend the gist or main ideas of a book

• when you don't understand a vocabulary word you read in a book

A summary should

• answer the 5 W's: who, what, when, where, and why

• describe the details but not the main ideas

• never mention the plot of the text

• always mention the age of the author

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

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.

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.