Summarization

What is a summary?

• When you tell the whole book.

• When you tell the most interesting ideas of any text using your own words.

• When you ask questions about a text.

• When you tell the most important ideas of any text using your own words.

Read the following passage and then answer the question.
The Elk River flows from the far northern part of the state all the way to the southern tip. All kinds of animals rely on it for drinking water, people eat the fish they catch in it, and farmers in the state depend on it for irrigating their crops. Since there is very little rain in this state, the Elk River gives animals and humans the water they need to stay alive. Even though the river is not nearly the biggest in the nation, it is very important to the people and animals that live near it.

• The Elk River is a small river.
• The Elk River starts in the northern part of the state.
• The Elk River is very important to people and animals.
• People catch fish in the Elk River.

Tags

CCSS.RI.4.2

CCSS.RL.4.2

CCSS.RL.5.2

CCSS.RI.5.2

CCSS.RI.3.2

Tomorrow is Samorah's birthday. She is excited because she gets to pick where she will eat dinner. Will it be Sushi at Sandals? Or will it be fried chicken at Frankies, or a big cheeseburger at T & T's. She just couldn't decide. Then there was always the Splash with that great pepperoni pizza. How would she ever decide? Maybe she would just flip a coin.

The Summary of this passage is:

• Samorah has many restaurants to choose from for her birthday.

• Samorah loves Sushi.

• Splash has the best pizza in town.

• Samorah will choose a place by flipping a coin.

Right now Ja'quan was playing right field. He really wanted to play third base. Earlier this year, coach had put him in left field and second base in a game, but never at third base. Once in practice, coach let him play third base, but he kept missing ground balls. When he did stop one, he made a bad throw to first base. Maybe if he kept practicing, Ja'quan would be good enough to play third base. That was his dream.

The Summary of this passage is:

• Ja'quan really wanted to play third base.

• Ja'quan was the best player on his team.

• Ja'quan had trouble catching ground balls.

• Ja'quan was too lazy to practice.

For the walls, Asia thought she would use a bright yellow paint. She would pick a border that had mostly bright red and green colors, and maybe a little bit of blue. She already had found some curtains that were sky blue with streaks of red, blue and yellow that she thought would go great with the walls. And finally, she had picked a carpet that was mostly blue with specks of red and yellow. Asia couldn't wait until she was done decorating her room. It was really going to look awesome.

The Summary of this passage is:

• Asia likes bright colors.

• Asia was going to paint her room.

• Asia was picking out colors and materials to decorate her room.

• Yellow is a good color to paint your walls.

Kaithlyn watched the ants as they carried small crumbs down the trail to the anthill. She thinks ants are very hard working and industrious little creatures. They always seemed busy, and you never saw an ant just laying around doing nothing. They were carrying food, building tunnels, or defending the anthill. One thing you could say about ants is that they sure aren't lazy.

The Summary of this passage is:

• Ants carry many things.

• Some ants may bite you.

• Ants are hard workers.

• Some ants help take care of the queen.

The first book Gettaro read in second grade was about a lost kitten. Then he read a book about a family of bears, and then he read about a wild kangaroo in Australia. It seems every book Gettaro reads is about animals. Last week he found a good book about snakes and reptiles, and another book about elephants. Today Gettaro went to the library, and he checked out a book about dolphins, whales and other animals that live in the sea.

The Summary of this passage is:

• Gettaro likes kangaroos.

• Gettaro is in the fifth grade.

• Gettaro reads a lot of books about animals.

• Dolphins and whales live in the sea.

Mr. Jingles was having a bad day. When he went outside in the morning for his daily walk, he discovered that it was raining. But when he turned around to go back inside, the front door wouldn’t open. Mr. Jingles ran around in the rain for a few minutes before he was completely soaked. Next he went searching in the bushes for a snack. But all of the sparrows in the bushes pecked at him and drove him away. Finally Mr. Jingles let out a long sad howl.“Oh Mr. Jingles!” Nakera opened the front door and found her poor cat, Mr. Jingles, soaking wet and hungry on the front steps. “Come inside and have some food. You can curl up by the fire and take a nap.”

Which sentence should go first in a summary of this text?

• Mr. Jingles went inside for food and a nap.

• Mr. Jingles went out in the rain and got wet.

• Mr. Jingles couldn’t catch a bird.

• Mr. Jingles couldn’t get inside.

It started when they got to the bears. Julien felt tired and his stomach hurt. He dragged himself over to see the elephants, which were eating from a stack of hay. Normally, the elephants were his favorite. Without much interest, Julien followed his classmates to the camels, which were busy swatting flies with their tails. Julien knew he should be having fun at the zoo, but he just felt terrible and all he wanted to do was lie down and rest. Even the lions and tigers did not interest him now.

The Summary of this passage is:

• Julien's favorite animals were the elephants.

• The camels were swatting flies with their tails.

• It was really hot at the zoo.

• Julien didn't enjoy the zoo because he felt really bad.

Read the following passage and then answer the question.

Kendria knew all of the seven dwarfs except one. She remembered Grumpy, Sleepy and Bashful. And of course she couldn't forget Doc and Dopey. Dopey was her favorite. But there was one she just could not remember. Let's see. There's also Sneezy, and that's six. But she could not remember that last one. What was his name?

• Dopey was Kendria's favorite dwarf.

• Kendria could not remember the name of one of the dwarfs.

• There were seven dwarfs in all.

• Kendria had a good memory.