Summarizing, Paraphrasing, and Retelling: Skills for Better Reading, Writing, and Test Taking

by Emily Kissner

Brand New. Will be shipped from US.

Genres: Teaching

Paperback

First published January 24, 2006

Reviews

[Leanne · Rating 5 out of 5]

You know you are crazy for teaching Language Arts when you find yourself calling a book like this fascinating.....I know . . . it's scary, but I really loved this book. I've never thought about all the skills involved in being able to summarize and I think Kissner makes a good case on why it is a skill we need to better understand and teach to our students!

[Ken · Rating 4 out of 5]

Nifty little book that breaks these venerable skills down into teachable parts. Most teachers just assume kids can summarize and paraphrase. Or we give it short shrift. Or we think they will learn by doing, doing, doing. But wait. With summarizing, for instance, researchers say kids must learn how to include important ideas, delete trivia, delete repeated ideas, collapse lists, and choose or create a topic sentence. Is that simple? It is if you think determining importance comes easily to kids (not), or if you think they all agree on a definition of "trivia" (not), or if you think they've even HEARD of such things as collapsing lists (heads up, lads!).

Theory, practical ideas, graphic organizers, and anecdotes from Kissner's own trenches are all here. Though especially appropriate for Grades 3 through 8, I can see more than a few high school teachers investing in this -- especially if their kids never seemed to learn these skills.

[Carmyn · Rating 3 out of 5]

I find this book hard to summarize. Tee hee. Actually, I need to revisit my copy to decide what to include in this review, but overall I felt it had really good ideas and some I plan to try with my students. I felt the retellings section was a bit weak and it was in the summarizing bit that Kissner was at her best.

[Karen · Rating 5 out of 5]

Since PARCC may have summarizing questions, this book will be helpful as a guide for teachers who see summarizing as a higher order thinking skill to be developed. In order to summarize effectively, students must sift through ideas to determine the most important, discard irrelevancies, and recognize text structure. This text gives multiple ideas that are effective and useful.

[Deborah · Rating 4 out of 5]

If you're a teacher, this is a very good book to have as a resource for teaching summarizing. The author gives good ideas that, although she teaches middle school, would apply or could be adapted for all levels of students.