Determining The Main Idea By: Ariana

What’s this for? To help improve us with our reading skills To help us find the authors purpose So we can improve our test-taking skills

How do we do this? You may ask….

Find Key Words or Details See what are the most important parts of the text

After that...

Summarize See what the text is MOSTLY about HINT: the author usually won’t come right out and say it in one sentence

Then… Once you have summarized you can find the main idea

Summary to Main Idea Sometimes you need to state your main idea in one sentence That means that you need to simplify it.

Long Summary Exp. The main idea of the text is about a mouse and his motorcycle. The mouse finds a flawless red motorcycle and decides to find out for himself if it runs. It turns out well for the mouse because the motorcycle turned on. He runs away.

Now… That was just an exp. Of a long main idea. Lets simplify the summary! All we need to do is find the main idea and key details! This next slide will show you the final product!

Final main idea exp. The text is mostly about a mouse that finds a red working motorcycle and decides to ride away in it.

Quiz Time!

What to do! Directions: Read the passage and then choose the best main idea!

Questions! Once upon a time there was a grateful duck that lived down near the creek. He was all exited because the holidays were coming! He would have an all you can eat buffet of fish. The duck (who’s name happens to be Wriggly) didn’t remember that many people loved to eat duck around the holidays! He just now realized why the people were giving him weird looks! That was why they were trying to fatten him up! Their not going to eat him without a fight. So he got up and bit a boy on the nose. The dad got so mad that he shot the duck to the ground! Then as it turns out, the dad said “I don’t know why the duck attacked, we and everyone else, were just fishing for fish!”

Answers! A) The text is mostly about a duck that made a mistake. He thought that fisherman were going to hunt him! Turns out that he was wrong, all the fisherman near the creek were just fishing for fish!

Answers! B) Okay, the text is about a duck.

Answers! C) The text is about a silly duck that got shot for no reason at all, he made a mistake thinking that all the fisherman were hunting him.

Answer Key! The correct answer is C. Don’t let the long main idea confuse you.

NEXT Here is the final question, remember to not let the long main idea answer confuse you.

LAST Question. Once in a dragons layer a mysterious witch awaits a little children’s arrival. She hasn’t had a good meal for hundreds and hundreds of years. Fortunately, all the villagers know about the EVIL witch. The witch has no idea about this (or does she?). Secretly, she was planning to sneak up on one of the villagers. On that night she spotted a chubby (or plump) 7 year old. She took him to her layer and stated to boil the slime. Turns out that the dragon had was going rabid. He started flying all around! He picked up the little boy and flew away. He ran out of the layer and into the village. He picked every thing in the village up, and flew away. No one ever saw the witch again.

Answers! A) The text is about a witch.

Answers! B) The text is mostly about an evil witch planning to eat a boy, but it turns out that she can’t because her dragon goes rabid and fly's away with all the villagers.

Answers! C) The text is mostly about an evil witch and her evil ways. She caught a boy and tries to eat him. Her dragon flies away and saves the people.

Answer Key! The correct answer is B.

Bye! Hope you had a fun time learning…..

Detimining The Main Idea!