 Summarizing reinforces and consolidates

the many processes involved in learning

from text.
 These processes include: determining
important information, perceiving text
structure, and drawing inferences.
 Helps students to pick out main ideas
instead of things that just may be of
interest to them.
 1. Select and delete information.

 2. Condense information by combining

or by substituting a general term for a
group of specific terms.

 3. Transform the information into writing.

 Hierarchical summaries are structured
around headings and subheadings found in
most content area texts.

 Students can learn to use this strategy

independently.

 Strategy is not effective with text that does

not have clear text organization or graphic
signals for important information.
 Procedure:
› 1. Students preview reading with emphasis on
headings, highlighted vocabulary, and other
cues.
› 2. Develop outline with teacher based on
preview of reading.
› 3. Students read text using the outline as a
guide.
› 4. Students compose main idea statements and
add supporting details, with teacher assistance.
› 5. Students develop a summarizing statement for
the entire reading that becomes the first
sentence of their summary.
 Read the text

 Encode into your own language

 Annotate by writing the message down

 Ponder the message on your own and

with others
 Four Step Sequence:
› 1. Show students a sample paragraph and a
sample annotation. Explain what an annotation
is and why they are used.
› 2. Show students another paragraph with three
annotations with one being a good summary
and the other two flawed. Lead students to
choose the correct one.
› 3. Show students how to summarize by modeling
using a different paragraph.
› 4. Allow students to individually make their own
summaries and share in groups to come up with
a complete summary of the paragraph.
 Generating Interactions between Schemata
and Text
 Used to produce more condensed summaries.
 When using the GIST strategy, you start with a
short, logical expository paragraph. Then you
do the following steps:
› Show students the first sentence of the paragraph and tell them
to summarize it in 15 words or less. Write summaries on the board
or overhead.
› Show students the second sentence of the paragraph. Erase first
summaries and tell students to summarize the first two sentences
in 15 words or less.
› Repeat the second step as many times as necessary until the
students have a good understanding.
› Allow students to produce summary statements individually.
 Start students that struggle with reading
with a text that is easier to summarize.
› Ex: A narrative text rather than an expository text
 Use passages with clear main points and a
clear structure.
 Model to students how to elaborate on
main point by asking questions like “who”
“what”, and “why” questions.
 Pair student with another student who
understands summarizing or ask for a
resource teacher in the classroom to help.
 Main ideas are more important than
things that may catch their eye or be of
interest to them.
 A summary should capture ideas that
may have been important to the author
of the text.
 Summarizing is not an exercise in
memorization.