How to summarise a text
Before you can begin to analyse the language or techniques being used by a writer, the effects these create and the methods used, it is important to be able to find the key information that you will analyse.
There are a number of techniques to use when finding information from a text, two of which are skimming and scanning.
Skimming
Skimming is letting your eyes and mind ‘skim’ over the text to get a quick but very general idea of it. You can’t read the text closely when skimming it, but instead you aim to pick out key words and sentences and get the general feel and meaning of the text.
A topic sentence is often the first sentence in a paragraph. You should always read it fully even when skimming as this will give you a summary of that paragraph’s subject and help you to gain a general idea of the content.
Scanning
Scanning is the method of looking for key words or phrases to find out specific information.
When summarising a text:
- look for the key information
- look at each paragraph, locate the topic sentence (often the first one) and decide what the main point is
- list the key points
- only include the main ideas of the text
Summarising practice
"Hold your noise!” cried a terrible voice, as a man started up from among the graves at the side of the church porch. “Keep still, you little devil, or I’ll cut your throat!”
It is a truth universally acknowledged, that a single man in possession of a good fortune, must be in want of a wife.
Skim and scan tasks
Skim the text below and pick out words which show Cathy’s dad’s “smelliness”:
Cathy was tired of her dad’s farting. He would sneak out for a "quick walk" in the evening and come back home reeking of beans. He was absolutely disgusting as he lumbered around the house parping, and stinking the place out. She tried candles but they didn’t improve things. What was a daughter to do?
Cathy was tired of her dad’s farting. He would sneak out for a "quick walk" in the evening and come back home reeking of beans. He was absolutely disgusting as he lumbered around the house parping, and stinking the place out. She tried candles but they didn’t improve things. What was a daughter to do?
The words that you pick out from the text are then the words that you will use to put your answer together. To put the answer together, you try to embed those words by using them in your own sentences, as in the example below:
Cathy is tired of her dad because he seems to be “farting” quite a lot. She says that the “farting” leaves him “reeking of beans” and she thinks this is “disgusting”. She describes how he “lumbered around the house parping”, which makes it sound as if he is like a big bear just walking slowly through the house with flatulence.
Skim the text below and pick out words that show Lewis’ fear:
Lewis had never kissed a girl before. He felt his hand tremble. He tried to speak but gave up as his mouth was dry and his tongue felt swollen. He gulped and stretched out around her shoulder. This was not very subtle and she smirked. He broke into a sweat. It was not going well, so he took his arm back again. He still had not kissed a girl.
Lewis is worried because he has never kissed a girl before.
The key words that show Lewis' fear are part of the phrases "hand tremble", "mouth was dry" and "broke into a sweat". They are all sensations associated with nerves.
What does this topic sentence suggest that the paragraph will be about?
Fare dodging is becoming a serious problem. More and more grannies are being caught pretending to be under 16. Mums have been wearing hoodies on their journeys to avoid payment. This is all causing a dramatic rise in fare prices.
The topic sentence is: Fare dodging is becoming a serious problem.
Also, look at the information in the sentences that follow the topic sentence. This is being used to back up and add detail to the topic sentence, in this example, examples of how fare dodging is happening.
In this case: "More and more grannies are being caught pretending to be under 16 and mums have been wearing hoodies on their journeys to avoid payment. This is all causing a dramatic rise in fare prices."
Quiz
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