What Is Summarizing?

Summarizing is reformulating the main idea of a text in a short form, in your own words.

How to Summarize

Example of elements to include in a summary

Narrative text elements
Main story events	Main ideas and actions in the story
Characters	Who is involved in the story and makes it move along
Setting	Where and when the story is taking place
Problem/Conflict	What set the story in motion, what made it start moving
Ending/Conclusion	How the story ends, how the problem/conflict is resolved
Informative text elements
Topic/subject	What the text is about
Key information	Main points the text is presenting
Information sources	Where the information is from
Author’s intention	Why the author wrote the text: to inform, to persuade, to entertain…
Fun facts	Text elements that make it an interesting read