I’ve made it to page 118 and I hope to finish the remainder of the book before Sun Belt starts on Monday.

Let me start by saying that I really liked how Rick Wormeli included the “Chart of Summarization Techniques” in the beginning of Part 3.  I believed he used his “Analysis Matrix” strategy to summarize his strategies for summarization!  I can see myself making a poster of this and placing it on my front board as a reminder to myself. I can easily look and “pull one out of a hat” for an activity at a moment’s notice.

I will be honest and say that I didn’t fall in love with all of his techniques. It wasn’t that I didn’t think they would work- it’s just that I think some of them would be a little difficult for my third graders.  The examples he gave of uses in the classroom all seemed to cater to middle-school students, however, all of them could be modified for use with younger students.

I did have some favorites.  I find myself using advanced organizers all the time, so I enjoyed reading the section on Analysis Matrices and Graphic Organizers.  I also really liked the body sculpture ideas. I have students who are timid and don’t always like to act in front of the class.  This strategy only has the student posing, so I think this might be less intimidating for some of them – especially if they can do it with a group.  

I never thought of using camp songs to help students remember important material.  I didn’t know all the tunes listed, but I did know most of them.  I know that I had some students last year that would have loved to complete this kind of activity – some I’m sure who will audition for American Idol Season….hmmmm….16?!

I’ve done the Carousel Brainstorming with a group of my peers, but I’ve never transferred it to my classroom.  I think that this may be an even better way to complete KWL charts – at the beginning and end of units.

I will definitely add the “Human Bingo” activity to my list of regular activities.  I think this activity would really get the students thinking and out of their seats to release some energy and the bingo sheets can be created quickly for a variety of topics.

How about you all? Any favorites?  Any ideas on how to incorporate his strategies into an elementary classroom?

P.S. – Have you all noticed that this blog’s spellcheck does not like the word “summarization”?  I’ve looked at it several times…am I spelling it wrong?

Well, I finally have my book and have some time to sit down and read.  I just finished reading only the first chapter, but thought I better blog a bit since I’m behind.

As I was reading, several thoughts popped into my head.  I reflected back on my teaching from previous years and recalled how my teaching practices evolved.  I remember cringing a little inside when I noticed the upcoming skill called ”summarization” appear on our pacing guide.  I didn’t really have enough knowledge of how to properly summarize something myself, so this made it even harder to translate this skill to a group of third graders.  The third paragraph on page 2 hit home to me. My students struggled with the same issues – some were including unimportant details, some were too detailed, others were not detailed enough, and very few “got it”. 

It wasn’t until this year, when our school’s reading coach trained our grade level using The Comprehension Toolkit,that I felt like I did a better job teaching summarization.  This kit was supposedly something the state purchased for all third grade teachers who had been trained through the Alabama Reading Initiative.  I’m not a big fan of a “scripted curriculum”, but after teaching a few lessons, it was easy to see the teaching process and adapt it to my personal language.  I was skeptical at first, but I found that the students really learned some useful comprehension strategies that transferred to subjects across the curriculum. Like this book mentions, I have found through this “toolkit” that it is better to summarize very small chunks of information, especially for the age of students that I teach.  Here’s the link to the toolkit site if you are interested: http://www.comprehensiontoolkit.com/

I am looking forward to reading about the creative strategies used to teach summarization and implementing them this upcoming school year.  I am hoping that through this, I will be less likely to “cringe” when teaching summarization and more likely to find comfort in the useful strategies that make this task less daunting.

-Amy

I have to agree with you Jennifer. Summarization is a key in our daily lives, but not one that we think about often, at least I didn’t until reading this chapter. As a teacher it’s easy to get into the same old rut and do what we are comfortable with. I know a fault I see in myself after reading this chapter is not using summarization effectively enough. We would summarize at the end of chapters or lessons, mainly in reading class, and not do much with the information. After reading this chapter I see that the mini summarizations throughout a lesson will be more effective for retention and will help guide the instruction. I will be able to see at exactly what point I lost a student and can quickly fix misunderstandings.
It also made me feel better that the authors were thinking that three good summarizations a week made for a good week. Thinking in those terms makes it seem doable and will make me think about what lessons I think hold the most important information for the week. Then I can plan for good summarization activities around them.
I must admit, I laughed when I read your post before I read chapter 1. How can she be looking forward to chapter 2? She’s just saying that because it sounds good. But, like you, after reading chapter 1, I glanced at chapter 2 and am also excited about learning the new things I see. I know I have a lot to learn on the subject and I need some new ideas. I don’t want to teach “parrots-in-training.”

As I began reading today, I was intrigued by Part 1 titled “The Case for Summarization”.  I think I was intrigued because we, as teachers, are sometimes very quick to throw something “old” out the window, because something new has come along.  While reading this chapter, I quickly see how summarization is one of those skills we will need the rest of our lives.  Even if we don’t always write the summary down, we summarize orally for our families about our day, we summarize in our mind newspaper articles or news events from television.  We constantly are reworking what we read or heard in our brain and that is summarization.  The book defines summarization as “restating the essence of text or an experience in as few words as possible or in a new, yet efficient, manner”.   

If I had to hit on a Top 3 from this chapter (what I have learned or taken away from or been reminded of) I would have to list the following:

1.  Summarization is an important teaching tool

2.  Chunking a lecture (give frequent breaks for them to summarize before continuing)

3.  Students must dig for information, make sense of it, and attach meaning to it.

I am looking forward to Part 2 on Summarization Savvy as I have glanced at the first few pages.  I can indeed tell that it will once again give me the opportunity to learn something new, remind me of something, or give me an Ah – ha moment!

We all chose to read the same book about summarization.  This book first lists the rationale behind summarizing, then gives strategies to teach students how to become summarizers.