Description: This strategy assists students with focusing on the main idea of the passage. Through class and group discussion, students have the opportunity to learn how others think as they state their ideas and reasons. Through this process teachers are able to check students’ understanding of summarization and determine if students can pinpoint the main idea.
Step-by-Step
- Assign students a short passage to read.
- After reading have students write one statement that reveals the “gist” or main idea of the selection.
- Discuss the reading and gist statements guiding students with questions such as “Is the passage mainly about a person, place, thing or idea?” Ask students if they agree. If not, have students explain what they feel was most important.
- After discussion, have students write a one sentence gist statement summarizing what the class decided was the main idea.
- Evaluate the gist statement to determine if students were able to state the main idea.
Extensions
- After writing two gist statements students write a justification for one over the other or explain how they came to an agreement.
- Students engage in reading chunked text and writing gist statements after each chunk. After completing the entire reading, students use gist statements to write a summary.
- When sending a telegraph, words cost money. Students must restate the gist/main idea using a minimal number of words.
- Many media utilize the news release or a news flash where the number of words (20 words or less) is limited or the entire piece must be read in 30 seconds. Have students write to conform to these standards.
- Create visuals of the gist statement instead of or in addition to written summaries.
GIST statement template- http://www.readwritethink.org/files/resources/lesson_images/lesson290/Template.pdf
Before-During-After w/ GIST statement-http://www.adlit.org/pdfs/strategy-library/csr.pdf