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Climbing into Reading

panda gif.gif

By: Emily Little

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Rationale: After beginning readers have mastered decoding and have a large sight vocabulary, they start focusing on comprehension. A large part of comprehension is summarization. We can test a student’s comprehension skills by asking them to summarize a passage or book that they have read. When summarizing, find an umbrella term for the important points made in the text. In this lesson, students will highlight important information, and write a two sentence summary on the passage read. The teacher will model these strategies before allowing the students to practice on their own.

 

Materials:

  1. Paper for each student

  2. Pencils for each student

  3. Copy of All About Giant Pandas for each student

  4. Sample passage to display

  5. Highlighters for each student

  6. Dry erase board and markers for teacher modeling

  7. Assessment Checklist

  8. Comprehension Quiz

 

Procedures:

  1. Say: “Has anyone read a really cool book and then told a friend about it? (Wait for class response.) I think we all have! Whenever we retell a story, do we give every little detail about what we know? (Wait for class response.)  No, we don’t. We just give them the important parts that are important for understanding. This is called summarization! Summarization helps us understand what is important.”

  2. Say: “Now we are going to practice a summarizing strategy known as about-point. How we do this is by asking ourselves two questions after we read a passage. Our first question can be answered quickly and easily, ‘What is this story about?’ The other is a little more difficult, ‘What point is the author trying to make?” Write these on the white board. “We will use our answers to compose a topic sentence. The word we use to describe the important part that the author is trying to talk about is the umbrella term.”

Tip #1: Read the passage carefully.

Tip #2: After reading, identify and highlight the main idea.

Tip #3: Find out what point the author is trying to make (our umbrella term).

Tip #4: Focus on why something is important vs. just knowing trivia

  1. Say: “Now, pandas live in the forest, which is a term some of you may not quite recognize. A forest is an ecosystem where there are trees and woody vegetation. If I were to use this in a sentence, I could say ‘There are lots of animals and insects that live in the forest.’ Now I will ask a question, ‘Do you think a shark, rabbit, or golden retriever lives in the forest?’ Right, a rabbit! Now I want you to complete a sentence using the word forest. ‘In the forest, a typical activity for a panda could be…’”

  2. “Now we are going to read a passage about giant pandas. These large, fluffy creatures love to eat and rest. Have you ever thought about what pandas eat? Have you ever wondered why pandas move very slowly? Let’s read and find out! I will give you all a little bit to read through this passage. Give me a thumbs up when you are done.” [Wait for students to finish reading]. Say: “Okay, now that we are done reading this passage, I want to explain the importance of knowing the importance of the information versus just knowing trivia. When you want to know the overall importance of a topic, all of the ideas will mix together to create a whole understanding of the entire passage. Trivia will only give you certain information about facts. Knowing the summarized information will help you understand the whole text. Now, I am going to model our about-point strategy of summarization for the first paragraph. I will think to myself, ‘What is this passage about?’ and ‘What point is the author trying to make?’ and ‘What does the first paragraph say that is important to remember about giant pandas?’ I will then form a summary sentence to explain all of these things. ‘Giant pandas are cute, large animals with black and white fur that like to eat bamboo in the forest.’ We can use these points to create a topic sentence. Now that I have created a sentence to summarize the first half, I want you to write a sentence summarizing the second and third paragraphs. After you have done this, write another sentence bringing all of the points together.”

  3. I will read each students sentences to make sure they have mastered the act of summarization.

 

Checklist:

Name: _________
Identified what the paragraph was about.
Identified the point that the author was trying to make. Combined the two about points.
Wrote a topic sentence for each paragraph.

 

Quiz:

  1. What color fur do pandas have?

  2. What do pandas like to do in their free time?

  3. What do they eat?

  4. Where are giant pandas found?

  5. Why do pandas move very slow?

  6. What are baby pandas called?

  7. How many years do mothers protect their cubs?

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Resources:

Caroline Rhyne, Hopping into Summarizing https://cpr0019.wixsite.com/my-site/rl-design

Kylie Witcher, Blast Off into Summarization https://kyliejwitcher2.wixsite.com/mysite-2

Emily Little’s written article with inspiration from: https://www.teacherspayteachers.com/Product/Early-Reader-Nonfiction-Animal-Articles-4966153

https://gifer.com/en/8DGC

https://creazilla.com/nodes/19744-giant-panda-clipart

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