Getting to the Essence, by Elizabeth Swartz

Writing summaries is like putting text through a shrinking machine! Here's how to get the idea across to students

Teaching children to summarize is a difficult task. The scary thing about summarizing to me, as a teacher, is that I'm basically asking students to take out all the details, explanations, settings, etc., that I have been trying to get them to put in all year! Somehow we need to help children distinguish what is most important and to report it in a concise manner without removing all of the excitement.

Textbooks often suggest taking a sentence or thought from the beginning of the article, one from the middle and one from the end. Well, that's a start, but do the students realize that the essence must remain?

The incredible shrinking text.
Let's try a shrinking machine instead. The students are all too aware of what happens when the dryer shrinks a sweater or a pair of jeans. The piece of clothing is smaller, but it's still a sweater or jeans. They have seen the movie, Honey, I Shrunk the Kids, so they know the kids are the same, just tinier. And they've seen two-hour movies cut for television. Let's use what they know.

Young children can be asked about their field trip and then asked to run the information through the shrinking machine because we don't have time to hear about the whole three-hour trip. We will need to help them visualize some kind of a machine at this point. Try enlarging the reproducible on the next page and using it for a visual.

Practice makes perfect.
Summarizing can be practiced orally and then written down. Your reading stories and science lessons can be used to practice summarizing on a daily basis. Kids can summarize what happened when the fire alarm rang.

Give parameters at first, limiting either the number of sentences or the amount of time allowed but, at the end of the summary, ask about the essence. Did getting stung by a bee at the apple orchard really summarize the field trip? For a first grader, it might! We need to remind ourselves that a summary has a lot to do with the author's viewpoint. It's often a subjective answer rather than an objective one.

Older students can use the reproducible page as a worksheet when they summarize concerts, dances, reading assignments and movies. The more often students are asked to summarize, the better they will become at it.

Asking your students for a summary of your year together can be revealing. It's often most helpful if you ask for a summary of separate subjects to get a look at the essence of your year together. And what about the teacher? How would you summarize this year? I hope it's been a good one for you. See you next year!

For the reproducible click here. PDF 32KB

Elizabeth Swartz is librarian at Watsontown Elementary School and Turbotville Elementary School in PA.