First Class Activities:
A. Students freewrite/brainstorm their definition of a summary;
they write about where and when they might have written or read
summaries, what associations they make with the word.
B . During the discussion that follows, the instructor should
elicit as much information about the summary as possible, ending
with a working definition of a summary, and a list of the significant
features of a summary. Students should be made aware that they
have already read summaries in their textbooks at the beginning
or end of the chapter, on book jackets, and in introductory or
concluding material in essays they may have read or written. The
instructor should also point out that summary skills are a common
academic task, and a common way our brains help us make sense
of the ordinary world, encapsulating the day's events or summing
up the important details of a movie or book for a friend. The
instructor should also make students aware of synonymous or closely
related kinds of writing students may be asked to perform; for
example, abstract, synopsis, paraphrase, etc. If time permits,
a quick analysis of the etymology of the words themselves can
help give students a better idea of the task involved. Because
students have written a preliminary summary for homework, they'll
have questions about what concerned them as they wrote–for
example, what tense is a summary written in, how many details
should I include, can quotes be used, etc.
C. After the whole class discussion,
students should work in small groups writing a collaborative summary
using, as a starting point, the individual summaries they completed
for homework. The teacher can circulate around the room during
this collaborative writing time, answering questions when necessary.
The information collected during the class discussion should remain
on the board for students to refer to as they write their group
summaries. Each group member should sign the group summary before
turning it in for credit. Students should be told that the teacher
will type up these group summaries for evaluation in the next
class period.
D. For homework, the teacher should
hand out another article for students to summarize at home on
their own. Students should be told that this summary will be peer
evaluated during the next class period and then revised and turned
in to the instructor. In preparation for the next class , the
teacher should type up the group summaries that have been collected
and photcopy them to distribute during the next class period.
(Generally student names are left off the handout.) The teacher
should also prepare another handout listing the features of a
standard summary and other points that have come up during the
class discussion.
2nd Class:
A. The teacher distributes a handout
of the group summaries and the checklist for writing an effective
summary based on the class discussion. The teacher briefly goes
over the checklist with the students. Working in small groups,
students will analyze each group summary using the checklist,
and pick the best one. After the small groups have had a chance
to pick their "winners," a large group discussion takes
place analyzing the strengths and weaknesses of each group summary.
B. After the discussion on the effectiveness
of the group summaries takes place, students should be allowed
to evaluate the individual summaries they wrote for homework and
revise where necessary according to their growing understanding
of the features of a good summary and by using the checklist the
teacher has distributed. Students might evaluate their own summaries
or exchange their summaries in pairs or small groups. Depending
on the time remaining, students might be asked to turn in their
revised summaries at the end of the period or to finish revising
at home for collection during the next class.
C. Follow-up activities: Instructors
might hand out copies of summaries written in other academic disciplines
or ask students to find examples of summaries/abstracts to bring
in to class as part of these exercises. If students are required
to write a research paper for the course, the ideal segue would
be to have students read and write summaries of articles to be
used in their research paper. Another possible culminating activity
might be to have students summarize another text as a preliminary
activity for writing the analysis.