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9th grade · English Language Arts · Unit 8 of 14

Summarizing Texts

Find the main ideas and put them in your own words.

What your child practices

Practices summarizing: grouping related ideas, separating important from less important information, paraphrasing and keeping the author's message.

New York State Learning Standards learning standard: 9-10R2 · finding central ideas and summarizing in your own words

How we explain it

Children can open this short lesson before they practice.

  1. Find the main ideas: topic sentences and key terms help.
  2. Leave out small details and examples. Group related ideas.
  3. Use your own words and keep the author’s message. Test it: would someone who hasn’t read it understand?

Example: Which belongs in a summary of a flood news story: what happened, where and the main effects, or every person’s quote? A summary keeps only the most important points. Every quote is too much detail. Answer: what happened, where, and the main effects

Summarizing Texts in New York

In the New York State Learning Standards, this is unit 8 of 14 in 9th grade English Language Arts, after Forms & Features and before Form & Composing.

Gradelings describes a child's practice on this unit as Beginning, Approaching, Meeting or Exceeding (Four practice steps). That reflects practice, not a report-card mark: the teacher decides the mark.

Source: New York State Education Department (NYSED)

Sample questions

A taste of this unit. In the app, questions change every time and get easier or harder to match your child.

  1. Question 1

    Which of these is the most important in a summary?

    • the page numbers
    • main ideas
    • minor examples

  2. Question 2

    Summaries can be used to…

    • replace the original text in a research essay
    • clarify meaning and support interpretation
    • avoid reading

  3. Question 3

    Which signal word would start a summary of an article?

    • In my opinion…
    • Once upon a time…
    • The article explains that…

  4. Question 4

    Which belongs in a summary of a news story about a flood?

    • every quote word for word
    • the reporter's lunch
    • what happened, where, and the main effects

  5. Question 5

    Copying sentences straight from a text and calling it a summary is…

    • plagiarism
    • paraphrasing
    • inferring

  6. Question 6

    A text says the same idea three times with different examples. In a summary you should…

    • leave the idea out
    • state the idea once, with one example at most
    • list all the examples

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