Coordintor: Jafar Dorri
Email: Jafar_dorri@yahoo.com
Guidelines for Publishing in My Contribution
The column entitled My Contribution is a recent initiative which is
intended to be a forum for sharing lesson plans and procedures for classroom
activities. Our assumption is that all teachers have original ideas for running
their lessons which work for them. We welcome a contribution which reflects an
original idea. Ideas taken from teachers’ guides can be of no help unless they
are sufficiently modified. The sign of an original idea is that it is a source
of excitement and pride to the originator to the extent that he/she would like
to tell others how it works. You can imagine yourself telling your colleague in
a very simple clear language how you carry out the activity in your class in a
stepwise manner. As your account is procedural it follows a certain structure
which is different from the structure of a research article. The column
includes instructions which tell the reader how to carry out the teaching
activities like the ones one can find in a recipe. In some cases specially in
the conclusion part you might want to provide a rationale for the activity by
referring to the literature but this needs to be kept at a minimum.
It should be noted that a lesson plan is the blueprint of those teaching
activities that are to be done in the classroom to teach the textbook content
with the aim of achieving its objectives. Every teacher tries to plan the
content in his/her own style so that he/she can teach systematically and
effectively. You can see the detailed guidelines for writing My Contribution in
in the box below.
Your “My Contribution” should include:
• A title, your name, affiliation, and email address;
• A “Quick guide” to the activity or teaching technique;
• No more than 700 words excluding the appendixes;
• An introduction (i.e. overview) followed by preparation and procedure
steps and a conclusion.
It should be:
• In Microsoft Word format;
• Double-spaced with an extra space between sections.
Main Idea Graphic Organizer
Fatemeh Nikui Nezhad, English Teacher, Kashan.
Email: fnikui@yahoo.com
Quick Guide
To enhance the comprehension of a text, students are required to read
selectively. This reading comprehension skill helps them consciously determine
what part of a text is important, what is supportive, and what is less
important. Pressley et al. (1998) found that students' comprehension was not
boosted by merely reading more text but applying reading skills can improve
comprehension. Teachers as models can show the students how to identify the
main idea and details in a text and organize the information in a Main Idea
Graphic Organizer.
Proficiency level: High school students-grade 12
Activity time and place: 30 minutes to model the main idea
identification skill in the 1st class session
Materials: Students’ English Book as well as various reading passages,
Main Idea Graphic Organizer for all students
Key Words: main idea, detail, topic,
graphic organizer
Introduction
Students will be better readers and comprehend more if they are
explicitly taught how to classify the information in a text into the main idea
and details. Teachers play the role of a model for the students to show them
how to find the main idea and the details supporting the main idea. Students
are provided with reading passages each session of the class as well as the
graphic organizer to practice this skill.
Lesson Procedure:
Step 1: Choose a short text or section of text and read it prior
to the reading session. Here the first lesson of Learning to Read English for
pre-university students has been chosen.
Step 2: Explain the concepts of main idea, details topic and
their important role in text comprehending to students. The topic of a text is
the subject, or what the text is about. A topic can be expressed as a noun or a
noun phrase. Some examples of topics include education, memory, and exercise.
However, an idea is what you say about a topic, which is expressed as a
sentence.
Step 3: Read the selected text aloud to students and give
explanations wherever necessary. Model the process of determining the main idea
of a text. Let them know that a main idea is the most important idea in a
passage usually stated in either the first or last sentence of a paragraph. Ask
them to look for the words repeated over and over again. Ask them to underline
all the supporting details that directly support the main idea.
Step 4: Once the passage has been read completely, pass out Main
Idea Graphic Organizer and have the students work collaboratively to write the
main idea and the supporting details on the graphic organizer (See Appendix 1).
Step 5: Repeat this activity several times during the different
class sessions so that students can fully understand how to determine and state
the main idea and details. If students have difficulty finding the main idea,
read the passage aloud and provide choices for the main idea statement and the
details. Challenge them to state the main idea since students need to be
involved in many guided practice on short texts in order to acquire mastery in
identifying the main idea.
Step 6: As a follow-up activity, get them to read more assigned
reading passages and fill in the graphic organizer at home.
Conclusion
When students are equipped with the skill of identifying main ideas and
working out the relationship between main ideas and supporting details, their
reading comprehension improves. Main ideas let students differentiate between
the important information and the less important details in a text.
The ability to identify the main idea in a text is critical for students
to gain meaning when reading. The teachers should explicitly teach students the
concept of main idea. When teaching the main idea, first short one paragraph
texts should be chosen on a familiar topic. Then, two or more paragraph texts
are introduced.
Reference
Pressley, M., Wharton-McDonald, R., Mistretta, J., & Echevarria, M.
(1998). Literacy instruction in ten fourth- and fifth-grade classrooms in
upstate New York. Scientific Studies of Reading, 2, 159-194.