A lesson plan for helping students to write nonfiction summaries.

1. Learn About Light:
Helping Students to Find Important Ideas
In order for students to write summaries, they need to be able to
find the important ideas in a text. Many of our readers have trouble with
this. They look at seductive details, copy and delete ideas, or work only
from the first few paragraphs of a text.
These lessons will show students how to figure out what is
important in text. Students will sort ideas from a text, first putting them
in the order in which they appear, and then pulling out the ones that are
not important. They are left with a list of the most important ideas from
the text, the perfect starting point for a summary.
2 Model Lesson for Using a very short text, the teacher
“What Is Light?” introduces how to sort ideas as
important or less important.
3 Text: “What Is Light?” A short text for the lesson
4 Ideas from “What Is A list of ideas from the text
Light?”
5 “What’s Important?” This page shows students rules for
figuring out what ideas are
important.
6-7 “Learn About Light” In this lesson, students will read a
lesson text with their partners, sort ideas,
figure out what is important, and
write a summary.
8 Before Reading page Use this page to introduce the
tough vocabulary to students.
Directions for students are also
included.
9-10 “Learn About Light” Reading level: 3-4
text
11-12 Ideas from “Learn
About Light”
13 Summarizing page Use this page for student
summaries
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2. Model Lesson for “What is Light?”
1. Copy the ideas from the text onto sentence strips.
(Alternatively, you could photocopy them on a
transparency.)
2. Arrange the ideas in random order on the chalkboard or a
pocket chart
3. Model reading aloud the text, “What is Light?”
4. Tell students, “We’re going to find the important ideas
from the text. First, though, we need to put the ideas in
order.” Call on students to arrange the ideas in order. **If
students cannot do this, work on this skill before you go on
to important ideas!
5. Tell students, “Let’s think about the most important ideas
from this text.”
6. Read the “What’s Important?” page with students. It’s
helpful for each student to have a copy of this page.
7. “Let’s think about which ideas are most important, and
take away ideas that are less important. Can anyone find
an idea that is not very important?”
8. Call on students to remove less important ideas. Remind
them to go back to the criteria in “What’s Important?”
9. After the less important ideas are removed, you will have
a list of the important ideas from the text in order.
10.You can stop here, or use this list to model writing a
summary. Remind students that they will need to put
ideas in their own words as they summarize.
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3. What is Light?
Have you ever watched sunlight coming in through
a window? You have seen an amazing form of energy!
Light is really a kind of energy that can travel through
space. Pretty neat!
Light travels in straight lines
Light can do many things. But there are some things
that light cannot do. For example, light always travels in
straight lines. It does not go around corners. A shadow
is formed when something blocks the path of light.
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4. Have you ever watched sunlight coming in through a window?
You’ve seen an amazing form of energy!
Light is a kind of energy
Light travels through space
Pretty neat!
Light can do many things
There are some things light can’t do
Light travels in straight lines
Light doesn’t go around corners
When something blocks light’s path, a shadow is formed
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5. What’s Important?
To figure out if an idea is important, ask these
questions:
• Does it relate to a key word or main topic from the
text?
• Is the idea repeated?
o Authors usually repeat really important ideas
• Does the idea relate to a heading?
o Headings usually include important ideas
• Does the idea explain the meaning of a key word or
main topic?
o It’s important to understand what key words
and main topics mean in order to understand
the main ideas
• Is it an example, transition, or seductive detail?
o Examples usually help to explain main ideas,
but are not the most important ideas in a text.
Transitions connect ideas, but don’t add
information. Seductive details are details that
are interesting or unusual, but don’t relate to
main ideas. These are not important.
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6. Learn About Light Lesson
1. Before the lesson, make a copy of the text for
each student. Also, copy the important ideas
onto cardstock, cut them out, and put them in
envelopes. (Hint: It helps to put numbers on
the back of each set so that they don’t get
mixed up.) Each pair of students will need a
set.
2. Use the “Before Reading” page to help
students with the pronunciation of the difficult
words from the text. Have students create a
prediction for what the text will be about.
3. Discuss the steps for reading the text.
4. Pair up students to read the text.
5. After students read, they will begin sorting the
ideas in the order in which they appear from
the text.
6. Then, students will use the “What’s
Important?” page to decide which ideas are
important, and which are not. Encourage
students to talk and share their ideas. This is a
fuzzy process.
7. After students sort their cards, discuss their
responses. There may be some disagreement!
But students should be able to sort out the
fluffy transitions (“Read on!”) from the
important ideas (“Light passes through
transparent items”). In all, students should
have about 8-10 important ideas, reflecting
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7. the definitions of transparent, translucent, and
opaque.
8. Hand out the summary sheets. Tell students,
“Now, we’re going to use our important ideas
to write a summary of this text. Remember to
put ideas into your own words.” You may want
to model an opening sentence—for example,
“In the text ‘Learn About Light’, the author
explains what happens when light hits
objects.”
9. The students now have a clear starting point
for their summaries. Applaud their progress!
10. In the next lessons, wean students away from
the physical sorting of ideas. Encourage them
to use the “What’s Important?” chart to help
them highlight important ideas for summaries.
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8. Before Reading: Learn About Light!
transparent opaque translucent
objects absorb refraction
Based on these words, what do you think the article will be about?
Directions for reading the text
1. Read the text with your partner.
2. Arrange the ideas from the text in order.
3. Use your “What’s Important?” page to figure out which ideas are
important, and which are less important. Take away the ideas that
are less important.
4. Listen as your class talks about the important ideas.
5. Work with your partner to write a summary of the text.
6. Reflect: What did you learn about important ideas? How can this
help you with summarizing?
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9. Learn About Light
If you have ever played with a flashlight, you know that
light travels in a straight line. On a dark walk in the woods,
you might notice that the flashlight’s beam goes from the
flashlight in a straight line.
But what happens when the beam of light hits an object?
That depends on what it hits. Scientists have studied how
different items react to light. Read on to find out what
happens!
Transparent: Light shines straight through
Suppose that you shine your flashlight at a window.
What will happen? The light will pass straight through. We call
items like this transparent. Transparent items are clear. We
can see through them.
It’s important for some items to be transparent.
Windshields need to be transparent so that drivers can see. If
you wear glasses, your lenses need to be transparent.
But not everything is transparent. What else can happen
to the beam of light?
Opaque: Light is absorbed
When you shine your light at a wall, the light does not
pass through. Instead, the light is absorbed. The wall is
opaque. Items that are opaque do not allow light to pass
through.
We have many items that are opaque. At your house, it’s
important for the walls to be opaque. You would not want
people to be able to see into your bedroom! What else can you
think of that is opaque?
Are there any items that are neither transparent nor
opaque? There are! What do we call these items?
Translucent: Light is refracted
Imagine shining your flashlight at a frosted window. The
light passes through. But you cannot see through the window.
We call this kind of object translucent. This means that some
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10. light can pass through, but you cannot see clearly through the
item.
What’s happening in a translucent object? Translucent
objects redirect the light. The beam of light bounces around
before passing through. This is called refraction.
It can be convenient to have translucent items. Often, the
glass in a bathroom or shower stall is translucent. This
translucent glass lets the light shine through, but is not
transparent.
The next time you have a flashlight, do some
experimenting! What can you find that is transparent?
Opaque? Translucent? It can be fun to learn more about light.
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11. Light travels in a straight line.
Read on to find out what happens!
Light passes through transparent items.
Transparent items are clear.
Windshields are transparent.
Glasses are transparent.
Light does not pass through opaque items.
A wall is opaque.
We have many items that are opaque.
Opaque items absorb the light.
Light passes through translucent items.
We can’t see clearly through translucent items.
Translucent items refract light.
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12. It can be convenient to have translucent items.
Windows can be translucent so that you can’t see
through.
The next time you have a flashlight, do some
experimenting.
It’s fun to learn about light!
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13. Summary: Learn About Light!
Emily Kissner
Summarizing, Paraphrasing, and
Retelling: Skills for Better Reading,
Writing, and Test-Taking
A guide for how to teach the related
skills of summarizing, paraphrasing,
and retelling. Rubrics for scoring
summaries and ready-made activities
included.
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14. The Forest AND the Trees: Helping
Readers to Identify Details in Texts
and Tests
This book looks at how to help
students identify details to find
important ideas, make inferences, and
answer open-ended response
questions.
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