Rationale: 

Comprehension is the ultimate goal of reading. Students who are at this level are ready to learn strategies to better understand a text. This lesson introduces the strategy of summarization. An effective method of summarization is called about- point, which asks two critical questions about the test. 1) What is the text about? While this question is easy, it helps locate the subject that will be in your topic sentence. 2) What is the main point the writer is making about the topic? Students will have to understand which information is important and which is trivial. In summarizing, only the most important parts are included. Being able to summarize leads students into asking higher level thinking questions and comprehension. 

Materials:

•  Individual copies of “Lion” article for each student

• Pencil and paper for each student

• Summarization checklist

• Cat Quiz 

• Dry erase board and marker

Procedures:

1.    Say: Have you ever been on such a cool trip or an unforgettable memory and want to tell your friends all about it? When you tell your friends about your trip or memory, you are summarizing! Summarization is a strategy that readers use to comprehend a book or article by only telling the most important parts through a summary. Summaries are important because you can’t remember everything, so you reduce what you read to remember the most important points that the author made about a topic.

2.   Say: One way we can summarize is by using a strategy called about-point. When we use about-point, you will ask yourself two different questions about your reading. [Write the questions on the board for students to reference]. You will answer a more surface level question, “What is the text about?” and a harder question, “What is the main point the writer is making about that topic?” When you answer the tough question, it will help you to identify the “umbrella term” that covers the important parts that the author has written. To find the important parts the author wrote, you must find and take away any trivial information. It helps to cross it out so you can’t see it. When you have the answers to these questions, it will later help you to formulate your sentences, especially your 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 “Lion.” You are going to read this article today so we can get the hang of summarization! Does anyone think they’ve ever seen a Lion? Did you know that a lion lives in a pack called a pride? They can live with a pride as big as 30 lions! In a little bit, we will learn more about the lions! 

4.   Say: One of the confusing words we need to go over before we can read the article is prey. [Write Prey on whiteboard]. A prey is an animal that is hunted or killed by another for food. Normally, prey is smaller than the animal catching them, but it doesn’t have to be! We could say that a lions prey includes antelopes, buffaloes, zebras, young elephants, rhinos, hippos, wild hogs, crocodiles and giraffes. But they also sometimes eat smaller prey like mice, birds, hares, lizards, and tortoises. Which one of these uses prey correctly? “The lion ran to catch its prey and caught it” or “The prey tried to sneak up and capture the lion.” Right, the first sentence is correct because the prey is the one that is getting hunted. The second sentence in incorrect because the lions prey wouldn’t prey after them. Try finishing this sentence: The lion was able to stalk its prey because…[Possible answers: the prey is smaller than him, the lion is faster, the lion is more sneaky, or various options. [write these on the board next to the word].

5.    Say: Now that we understand the word prey, we will look at a paragraph from the article together: “Female lions are the primary hunters of the group. They are smaller and more agile than males. But since their prey is still generally faster than them, they use teamwork to bring an animal down. Fanning out, they form a semicircle, with the smaller, weaker lionesses herding the prey towards the center. Then the stronger females knock the animal down and make the kill.” This paragraph is about female lions, but what are important pieces of information the author presents? The female lions are the main hunters. They are smaller and more agile than the male lions. I can form a topic sentence by joining these two points: Since female lions are smaller and more agile, they are the main hunters of the pride.

6.   Say: It’s your turn to try about-point! Read these sentences: “Unlike other cats, lions are very social animals. They live in groups, called prides, of around 30 lions. A pride consists of up to three males, a dozen related females, and their young. The size of the pride is determined by the availability of food and water. If resources are scarce, the pride becomes smaller.”

7.   Say: What is this paragraph about? Correct, lions. What are the important pieces of information that the author makes about lions? Yes! They are very social animals. What is another point that the author makes? Good, they live in prides of around 30 lions. To make a topic sentence, you will put these points together! Let’s try: lions…? Lions live in prides of 30 lions because they are social animals.

8.   Say: Now, I want you to finish reading the article and write a topic sentence for each paragraph using about-point. By the time you have done this for every paragraph, you will have a very good summary about the entire article.  Your summary will help you remember the key details about lions. 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 help. Don’t forget to only pick out the key details that the author is making in each paragraph, and to summarize those in your own words. When you are finished, you can turn your sheet into me. 

9.    I will review each student’s submission to see if they accurately summarized. I will use the checklist below for grading purposes. Lastly, students will take a short quiz to demonstrate understanding of the passage. 

 

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 are the groups called that lions live in? 

2. Why do female lions hunt over males?

3. What is one prey of the Lion? 

4. Where were lions once found? 

5. Why do the male lions roar? 

 

 

References:

“Lion” https://animalfactguide.com/animal-facts/lion/

Caroline Shea. Whale let’s Summarize! https://chs0025.wixsite.com/lessondesigns/reading-to-learn

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