Teaching
Summary Writing
Summarizing is a very important skill! Teaching summary writing makes the retelling of stories bearable (and sometimes even interesting!) Students who develop this skill can also support their opinions in extended writing, e.g. essays.
The purpose of a summary is to condense a long text into only the most important points. Since the original text is too long to quote, students need to summarize. The most difficult component of summarizing for students is moving away from the original text and using their own words to restate the information.
In classes where I am teaching summary writing, I present my students with 5 steps to writing a summary to guide them from a longer text into something short and understandable.
Ideas for Classroom Practice
Select a text that is from 1,500 to 3,000 words in length. This is about the length of an article in a magazine or a webpage.
Have students practice in groups first. In groups they can discuss the author's meaning and help each other decide what are key points to keep and what are details to toss out. (Click here for more on helping students work effectively in groups.) Students can either write their summary as a group, or have each student write a summary individually.
As with any skill, teaching summary writing will help students understand the framework for writing a summary. This combined with practice will lead to better summaries.