Summarizing

= **__Definition__** = Summarizing: restating the main ideas

= **__How does summarizing help the reader with comprehension?__** = Summarizing ensures that students are picking up on the most important information. Students are forced to review materials for the main ideas and retell the information in a shortened form.

= **__How does the strategy work?__** = Children are naturally storytellers. Summarizing takes the skill of retelling and focuses on the information that is most important. Students must be taught how to differentiate between the points that they find interesting and the points that are relevant to the summary.

= **__Features, Techniques, Charts...__** = Encourage students to get organized! Graphic organizers are an effective strategy for organizing the main points of a story.







In early stages of summarizing, students can reenact the main parts of a story. ex: If one of the main points is that the dog chased the cat, two students could act out a dog chasing a cat

Eventually, this can lead to imagining the main parts of the story.

Questions to ask... 1. What were the main things that happened? 2. If you had to tell me what this was about, very briefly, what would you say? 3. What happened at the beginning/middle/end?

= **__Picture Books__** = Any picture book can be summarized! Try to find books that have a clear plot with a beginning, middle, and end.