Crashing into Comprehension

By: Marion Dukes

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Rationale: Comprehension is the final, and most important, step in a student’s reading development. If a student is reading for comprehension, they are no longer spending time decoding words, but now are focused on understanding the message of the text. A great way to test a student’s comprehension is to have them summarize a book that they have already read. In this lesson, students will practice summarization as a strategy of reading comprehension. The students will summarize text by only using important information from the text. Students will use the following summarization rules: mark out information that is not important or repeated, find and highlight important information, form a topic sentence, and find an umbrella term for the events that happen in the text. The teacher will model how to detect important information that is needed to write a summary.

 

Materials:

• Summarization Rules on a poster

  1. Leave out unimportant information

  2. Leave out repeated information

  3. Pick out important information

  4. Create a topic sentence

  5. Find an umbrella term for the events that happen in the text

• Class copies of “Bottlenose Dolphins” https://kids.nationalgeographic.com/animals/mammals/orca/

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• Dry erase board and marker

• Summarization checklist

• Comprehension quiz

 

 

Procedures:

1. Say: Who in this classroom has ever been asked to read an article or book and explain what it was about? Did you find yourself having a hard time remembering all of the information given to you in the story? Yes? Well we have all had this same experience. Today, we are going to learn a strategy that will help to make remembering all of the information much easier for us. Our new strategy that we are going to learn is called summarization. Summarization is the ability to say, in a few words or sentences, what a whole article or book is about. We are going to start class by reading an article about Bottlenose Dolphins.

2. Say: One way we can summarize is by using a strategy called about-point. When we use this strategy, you will ask yourself two different questions about your reading. You will answer an easy question, “what is the text about?”, and a tough question, “what is the main point the writer is making about that topic?” [Write these two questions on the white board for students to have for reference]. When you answer the tough question, it will help you to identify an “umbrella” term that covers the important parts that the author has written. The answers to both of these questions will help you make a topic sentence. 

3. Say: Later in this lesson, I will model how to practice the about-point strategy with a paragraph in an article called “Bottlenose Dolphins.” You will read this article today while you practice summarization. Have you ever seen a bottlenose dolphin? According to the article, they are six to twelve feet long and shed their skin every 2 hours. In a few minutes, we will read the article to learn more about these specific dolphins.

4. Say: You need to know what the word “varies” means in order to understand the paragraph we will read together. When something “varies”, that means that it changes. For example, some days you might be more tired than others. The amount of energy that you wake up with each day, varies depending on multiple things! Did you go to sleep on time? Did you sleep well throughout the night? Did you have any dreams or nightmares? These are all things that can affect your energy levels. Just like your energy levels vary, certain aspects of the Dolphin’s life varies as well! 

5. Say: Now that we understand the word “varies”, we will look at a paragraph from the article together: “Orcas hunt everything from fish to walruses, seals, sea lions, penguins, squid, sea turtles, sharks, and even other kinds of whales. Depending on the season and where they are, their diet varies—some orcas eat more fishes and squid than seals and penguins. But wherever they are in any of the world's oceans, average-sized orcas may eat about 500 pounds (227 kilograms) of food a day. Orcas have many hunting techniques, and bumping seals off ice is just one of them.” This paragraph is about Orcas, but what important points does the author make? Orca’s hunt everything from fish to walruses, penguins, turtles, and even other whales. Orca’s may eat 500 pounds of food in a day. I can form a topic sentence by joining these two points. “Orca’s hunt everything from fish to walruses, penguins, turtles, and other whales, and may eat 500 pounds of food in a day.”

6. Say: It’s your turn to try about-point! Read this paragraph next: “Often referred to as wolves of the sea, orcas live and hunt together in cooperative pods, or family groups, much like a pack of wolves. They work together as they hunt. Groups of orcas cooperate to herd fish into a compact area so that they're easier to eat. They will also slap their tails onto the water's surface, causing a wave to wash prey, such as penguins or sea lions, off ice floes and into the water. Sometimes a pod of whales will join forces to surround a larger animal, such as a blue whale. They chase, bite, and wear it down until it becomes a meal.”

7. Say: What is this paragraph about? Correct, Bottlenose dolphins! What are the main points that the author makes about Bottlenose dolphins? Yes! They due use echolocation. What is the other point that the author makes? Sometimes, they make friendships that last decades. They even help each other hunt. To make a topic sentence, you will put these points together! Lets try: Bottlenose dolphins…? [Bottlenose dolphins have a sharp sense of hearing. Scientists believe that the sounds travel through the dolphin's lower jaw to its inner ear and then are transmitted to the brain for analysis.]

8. Now, I want you to finish reading the article and write a topic sentence for each paragraph using about-point. This will allow you to have a strong summary of the whole article once you are finished. Your summary will help you remember the most important facts about Bottlenose Dolphins! Remember to answer both questions in about-point to help you form a topic sentence. You can look at the board for the questions if you need to. Don’t forget to only pick out the most important points that the author is making in each paragraph, and to summarize in your own words. When you are finished, staple your topic sentence page to the article and turn it in to me.

9. I will review each student’s topic sentence page to determine if they successful summarized the paragraphs of the article. I will use the assessment checklist to record student grades. The students will also take a brief comprehension quiz. 

 

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Checklist:

 

Student Name: ____________________

1. _____ Wrote a topic sentence for each paragraph. 

2. _____ Deleted unimportant or repetitive information.

3. _____ Significantly reduced the text from original to form       summary.

4. _____ Identified important points

5. _____ Successfully conjoined the important points to form a topic sentence.

 

Quiz:

1. What is another name for the Orca?

2. What kind of water do bottlenose dolphins like to swim in?

3. How fast can a bottlenose dolphin swim?

4. How big can a bottlenose dolphin get?

5. What does echolocation tell the dolphin?

6. How do bottlenose dolphins communicate?

7. How high can a bottlenose dolphin leap into the air?

8. What do bottlenose dolphins eat??

 

 

References

 

Kaleigh Coltrain, “A Sloth’s Summarization”

https://klc0083.wixsite.com/mysite/rl

 

Savannah Newton, “Splashing into Summarization”

https://savnewton.wixsite.com/mywebsite/reading-to-learn

 

Jennifer Ross, “Coloring a Summary!”

https://sites.google.com/view/mrsrosslessonhomebase/reading-to-learn-lessons/coloring-a-summary 

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