Shrinking Paragraph Template

The Shrinking Paragraph: A Summarization Strategy

What is a summary and what does it mean to summarize?

· Summarizing is how we take larger selections of text and reduce them to the bare essentials.

· Summarizing means including only the most important information.

· A summary tells the main idea of the text.

Step One: Evaluate the headlines and organizational pattern of the two articles.

Article One: Headline: Emotional or intellectual appeal? Supported by which words?

Format: Inverted Pyramid or Narrative format? Supported by which evidence?

Article Two: Headline: Emotional or intellectual appeal? Supported by which words?

Format: Inverted Pyramid or Narrative format? Supported by which evidence?

Step Two: Write a summary of each article you have read in 75–85 words.

Article One:

Article Two:

Step Three: Shrink it! Take the summaries you have written above and cut out those words and phrases that are “fluff”—that is, words that are not necessary to the main idea of what you have written. Reduce your summary to 45–50 words.

Article One:

Article Two:

Step Four: Shrink it again! Can you do it? Now, take the summaries from Step 2 and combine them into one summary of two paragraphs. Try to make it more succinct—include only the information that truly summarizes (or captures the meaning of) the text. Combine and reduce the two summaries into one summary of 25–30 words.

Step Five: Develop two headlines for your new article.

Emotionally appealing headline:

Intellectually appealing headline:

Step Six: Evaluate and choose your headline. Select one of your headlines and apply the evaluation questions. Revise your headline based on your responses.

How easy is it for the reader to break down the meaning of the headline?

Are all of the words in the headline necessary?

Is the meaning of the headline ambiguous?

Step Seven: Create an outline for your article using an inverted pyramid format. Use supporting details from the two original articles.

Step Eight: Write your news article on Myanmar, combining details from the two original articles.