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READING TO LEARN DESIGN

Summarizing in Saturn

 

 

 

Rationale: The goal of reading is comprehension. Students need to comprehend what they are reading for it to be useful information for them. Summarization supports comprehension by highlighting the important aspects and eliminating unwanted information. This lesson is to help the student select main ideas of a passage effortlessly.

Resources: highlighter, expo marker, copy of the article “Mission to Saturn” for each student, book mark with helpful tips such as: “Read the paragraph once all the way through. Reread the paragraph and highlight key points. Write down the key points.”, Copy of “The Self-Assessment Rubric” http://www.readwritethink.org/files/resources/lesson_images/lesson277/rubric.pdf

Procedures:

  1. Introduce the lesson. “Today we will be learning how to summarize what we read, does anyone know what it means to summarize?” *give students time to answer* “Great guesses, summarizing is taking the main points of a story and explaining them in your own words. So today we will be reading an article on Saturn and summarizing it together”

  2. Pass out a copy of the article to all the students. “First I am going to read this article aloud and I want you guys to follow along in your head” *read article* “Now I want everyone to read the article again and this time highlight the information you think is important, I will write the information I think is important on the board after I read it silently again too”. *write the following statements on the board*

  • Saturn is the sixth gas ball from the sun

  • It takes three years to get to Saturn from Earth.

  • More than 750 time the size of Earth.

  1. “Look over my notes, these were things I thought were important as I was reading the article. Now I want you guys to take a few minutes to write 3-5 sentences summarizing what this article has taught you. Remember to use major details and leave out the minor insignificant facts.” *Give the students 10 minutes to write down their thoughts*

  2. “Get with a partner and share your summaries, see if the two of you thought similar things were important from the article. Collaborate and see if there is anything you want to add or change about your summary.” *Pass out the Self-Assessment rubric* “Now I want you and your partner to grade one another based on this rubric.”

  3. *Give the students time to look over and grade assignment* “Please turn in your rubric with your summary when you have both completed the assignment.”

Resources: McClendon, Samantha. “The Shorter The Better” http://www.auburn.edu/academic/education/reading_genie/voyages/mcclendonrl.html

"The Self-Assessment Rubric"
http://www.readwritethink.org/lesson_images/lesson277/rubric.pdf

Mission To Saturn

https://kids.nationalgeographic.com/explore/space/mission-to-saturn/#saturn-planet.jpg

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