How to teach summarizing in the early grades

This is the final episode in our series about reading comprehension strategies! Let’s talk summarizing.

What does it mean to summarize a text?

When you summarize a text, you give a brief statement of the main points.

Why should students learn to summarize?

Summarizing goes hand-in-hand with comprehension monitoring and is a powerful strategy for improving comprehension (National Reading Panel, 2000).

Students should start with oral summaries and gradually progress to written summaries, since we know that writing about their reading improves students’ comprehension (Graham & Hebert, 2011).

What’s the simplest way to teach summarizing for the early grades?

I recommend the paragraph shrinking strategy from Fuchs & Fuchs (2005). This can be done orally after a whole class read-aloud or in pairs after partner reading.

(It’s not just for the early grades, either … you can use this strategy through high school!)

How to teach paragraph shrinking

1. Introduce the strategy.

Today you will learn a strategy called Paragraph Shrinking. After I read each paragraph of our passage, we will shrink it by stating only the most important information. Paragraph Shrinking is also called summarizing.

2. Explain why you’re teaching the strategy.

Summarizing is a way to help you understand and remember what you read.

3. Model Paragraph Shrinking and gradually involve your students in the process.

a. Listen to me read the first paragraph of this passage about Louis Braille. (By the way, ChatGPT created this passage for me. I simply wrote, “Write a third grade level passage about Louise Braille. Each paragraph should be clearly about one main thing.”)

b. The first thing I need to do is name the who or what. This passage is about Louis Braille.

c. Now I need to identify the most important thing about Louise Braille in this paragraph. This paragraph tells us that Louis Braille was clever. It tells us that he hurt his eye and became blind. It tells us that loved learning, and he went to a school for the blind. I think that most important thing in this paragraph is that he hurt his eye and became blind.

d. Finally, I will put this information into a sentence that’s 10 words or less. I’ll put up my finger for each word that I say. If I start to run out of fingers, I’ll have to start over.

“Louis Braille hurt his eye when he was young and … ” I’m already at ten words. Let me start over.

“Louis Braille became blind when he was three years old.” Perfect!

e. Listen to me read the next paragraph.

f. What is the most important who or what in this paragraph? Yes, Louis Braille is the most important who or what.

g. What’s the most important thing about Louis Braille in this paragraph? You have one minute to discuss this with your partner … __________, what is the most important information about Louis Braille? Yes, he made a special code that helped blind people read. Let’s put that into a complete sentence that’s 10 words or less.

Louis Braille created a special code that helped blind people … oh, I’m already at 10 words. Let me try again.

Louis Braille created a code that helped blind people read.

We did it!

h. Listen to me read the final paragraph.

i. What is the most important who or what in this paragraph? Hint … it’s not Louis Braille! The most important who or what is Louis Braille’s special code.

j. What’s the most important thing about this special code? Yes, it helped people all over the world.

k. Let’s put this information into a summary that’s ten words or less.

Louis Braille’s special code helped people all over the world.

 

See the strategy in action

If you’d like to learn more about paragraph shrinking – and how to give students practice using this strategy with a partner – I highly recommend this video from Lindsay Kemeny. She explains how partner reading, with paragraph shrinking, builds fluency while also supporting comprehension.

And don’t forget to check out the rest of our series about reading comprehension strategies!

References

Fuchs, D., & Fuchs, L. S. (2005). Peer-assisted learning strategies: Promoting word recognition, fluency, and reading comprehension in young children. The Journal of Special Education, 39(1), 34-44.

Graham, S., & Hebert, M. (2011). Writing to read: A meta-analysis of the impact of writing and writing instruction on reading. Harvard Educational Review, 81(4), 710-744.

National Reading Panel (U.S.) & National Institute of Child Health and Human Development (U.S.). (2000). Report of the National Reading Panel: Teaching children to read: An evidence-based assessment of the scientific research literature on reading and its implications for reading instruction. U.S. Dept. of Health and Human Services, Public Health Service, National Institutes of Health, National Institute of Child Health and Human Development.Agarwal, P. K., & Bain, P. M. (2019). Powerful teaching. Jossey-Bass.