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Help
11 May 2006 - 14:23
I want this software, I think.
retelling I've been on an intensive Google Quest for a Plan. At the moment, it looks like I'm going to have to teach Christopher how to write and do math in the tiny fragments of time not eaten up by 6-hour school days, homework, and teaching to crammery. From what I gather, asking a child to write "retellings" (an Engelmann term, I believe) and summaries is probably the ticket. (I'm defining "retelling" as retelling a story or perhaps writing a how-to; I think of "summarizing" as applying to expository, analytical, and persuasive writing. Don't know whether this is the distinction Engelmann uses.) Teaching a child to retell and summarize makes sense to me for a number of reasons I won't take the time to go into just now. The good news is that I've stumbled across "converging lines of evidence." Different people coming at this issue from different directions have arrived at the same conclusion: retelling & summarizing are the keys to the kingdom — or, at least, retelling and summarizing are the Keys to the Kingdom of extremely efficient writing instruction. The question guiding my Google Quest has been: What would KUMON for writing look like? I'm pretty sure it would be a program that has kids write retellings and summaries on a daily basis. * More later.
resources Summary Street (press release - Pearson Knowledge Technologies) WriteToLearn (Pearson) WriteToLearn demonstration site (Pearson) Intelligent Essay Assessor (Pearson) WriteToLearn (press release) Writing a Good Summary (Pearson) Summary Street (Colorado Latent Semantic Analysis) Latent Semantic Analysis (Colorado University Boulder) dissertation on Summary Street (pdf file)
sample assessment screen Summary Street
* As a matter of fact, KUMON Reading does teach summarizing in later levels. teachtocrammery
-- CatherineJohnson - 11 May 2006 Back to main page.
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Speaking of "converging lines of evidence," the Charlotte Mason method of homeschooling relies heavily on children summarizing stories they've been read. Verbally when the kids are little, and then as they get older, in writing. -- StephanieO - 11 May 2006
GREAT! THANKS. I'll pull my thoughts together later, but I'm SURE this is critically important - even if you don't have to teach writing to crammery. The final bit of evidence for me is the experience of listening to kids retell stories they've read or seen on TV. They're not very good at it! -- CatherineJohnson - 11 May 2006
A HUGE amount of what I do as a writer, not to mention a "blooki-er," is to summarize other people's writing. It's an art. -- CatherineJohnson - 11 May 2006
It's funny when I ask my three year old to summarize something. I'll try this after we've read a story several times. Initially, he'd just recount every detail he could, starting from the beginning (and you know how toddlers can memorize a story!). So I described what a summary is, and summarized the story myself to give an example. After that instruction, he picked out parts that were funny or full of emotion and gave those as his summary. To be fair, Charlotte Mason recommends starting verbal summaries with 6 year olds. But it's fun to see what he'll say, and I should really record some of these summaries for posterity, too. -- StephanieO - 11 May 2006
oh Stephanie, you MUST I'd put money on it that this is a "core skill" - a fundamental aspect of what writing (and probably thinking) actually is I don't know of anyone who's looked at a "sequence of development" in the ability to retell & summarize! DO IT! -- CatherineJohnson - 11 May 2006
Summary Street
I want this software, I think.
retelling I've been on an intensive Google Quest for a Plan. At the moment, it looks like I'm going to have to teach Christopher how to write and do math in the tiny fragments of time not eaten up by 6-hour school days, homework, and teaching to crammery. From what I gather, asking a child to write "retellings" (an Engelmann term, I believe) and summaries is probably the ticket. (I'm defining "retelling" as retelling a story or perhaps writing a how-to; I think of "summarizing" as applying to expository, analytical, and persuasive writing. Don't know whether this is the distinction Engelmann uses.) Teaching a child to retell and summarize makes sense to me for a number of reasons I won't take the time to go into just now. The good news is that I've stumbled across "converging lines of evidence." Different people coming at this issue from different directions have arrived at the same conclusion: retelling & summarizing are the keys to the kingdom — or, at least, retelling and summarizing are the Keys to the Kingdom of extremely efficient writing instruction. The question guiding my Google Quest has been: What would KUMON for writing look like? I'm pretty sure it would be a program that has kids write retellings and summaries on a daily basis. * More later.
resources Summary Street (press release - Pearson Knowledge Technologies) WriteToLearn (Pearson) WriteToLearn demonstration site (Pearson) Intelligent Essay Assessor (Pearson) WriteToLearn (press release) Writing a Good Summary (Pearson) Summary Street (Colorado Latent Semantic Analysis) Latent Semantic Analysis (Colorado University Boulder) dissertation on Summary Street (pdf file)
sample assessment screen Summary Street
* As a matter of fact, KUMON Reading does teach summarizing in later levels. teachtocrammery
-- CatherineJohnson - 11 May 2006 Back to main page.
Comments
After entering a comment, users can login anonymously as KtmGuest (password: guest) when prompted.Please consider registering as a regular user.
Look here for syntax help.
Speaking of "converging lines of evidence," the Charlotte Mason method of homeschooling relies heavily on children summarizing stories they've been read. Verbally when the kids are little, and then as they get older, in writing. -- StephanieO - 11 May 2006
GREAT! THANKS. I'll pull my thoughts together later, but I'm SURE this is critically important - even if you don't have to teach writing to crammery. The final bit of evidence for me is the experience of listening to kids retell stories they've read or seen on TV. They're not very good at it! -- CatherineJohnson - 11 May 2006
A HUGE amount of what I do as a writer, not to mention a "blooki-er," is to summarize other people's writing. It's an art. -- CatherineJohnson - 11 May 2006
It's funny when I ask my three year old to summarize something. I'll try this after we've read a story several times. Initially, he'd just recount every detail he could, starting from the beginning (and you know how toddlers can memorize a story!). So I described what a summary is, and summarized the story myself to give an example. After that instruction, he picked out parts that were funny or full of emotion and gave those as his summary. To be fair, Charlotte Mason recommends starting verbal summaries with 6 year olds. But it's fun to see what he'll say, and I should really record some of these summaries for posterity, too. -- StephanieO - 11 May 2006
oh Stephanie, you MUST I'd put money on it that this is a "core skill" - a fundamental aspect of what writing (and probably thinking) actually is I don't know of anyone who's looked at a "sequence of development" in the ability to retell & summarize! DO IT! -- CatherineJohnson - 11 May 2006
| WebLogForm | |
|---|---|
| Title: | Summary Street |
| TopicType: | WebLog |
| SubjectArea: | TeachingWriting |
| LogDate: | 200605111020 |