Ask a middle schooler to summarize a chapter and you usually get one of two things: a retelling that goes on longer than the chapter itself, or three sentences copied almost word for word from the text. Neither one is summarizing. Both are signs the student was never taught what to leave out.
Summarizing is a leaving-out skill. Once I started teaching it that way, the work changed fast. Here is the routine I use.
Step 1: Ban the retelling with a word limit.
Start every summary with a hard limit: 25 words or fewer for a short passage, 50 for a chapter. Say it out loud and enforce it kindly but firmly.
The limit does the teaching. A student cannot retell everything in 25 words, so they have to choose. Choosing is the whole skill. If the first drafts are clumsy, that is fine — at least now you can see their thinking instead of their copying.
Step 2: Teach SWBST as a sentence frame, not a poster.
For fiction, I use Somebody-Wanted-But-So-Then: Somebody (the main character) Wanted (a goal) But (a problem got in the way) So (what they did) Then (how it ended, for now).
Model it once with a story everyone knows, then once with your current text while students follow along. Keep the frame on the board for the first two weeks, then take it down. A frame students still need in May was never really taught — it was just displayed.
For nonfiction, swap it for a simpler frame: The text is mainly about ___. The most important detail is ___ because ___.
The same leaving-out moves also help with vocabulary in context, where students have to choose the meaning that fits the passage.
Step 3: Model the delete, keep, combine moves.
Write a messy paragraph summary on the board — yours, made up on purpose — and think aloud while you fix it. Delete the detail that is interesting but not important. Keep the sentence the whole passage depends on. Combine two short sentences that say almost the same thing.
Students copy summaries because nobody showed them this middle work. Show it three days in a row, for five minutes each, and the copying drops because they finally have another move to make.
Step 4: Practice in pairs before anyone writes alone.
Have partners read the same short passage, draft a summary together, and count the words out loud. Then pairs trade summaries and check one thing only: did anything important get left out, or did anything unimportant sneak in?
That single check is easier to give and receive than vague feedback, and it trains the exact judgment summarizing requires. Solo summaries come after two or three paired rounds, not before.
Step 5: Check the summary against the text, not your memory.
When you assess, keep the passage open next to the summary. Mark two codes only: M for a missing main idea, X for an extra detail that does not belong. No long comments.
Students revise one code at a time in the next class. Fast codes keep the routine sustainable for you, and a summary a student revises teaches more than a summary you grade and hand back a week later.
If students can find a main idea but struggle to prove it, my text evidence routine gives them a highlight-and-prove move to use before they summarize.
A good summary is proof a student understood what they read — not that they can repeat it. Give them a word limit, a frame, and a chance to practice the leaving-out moves, and the copy-paste summary disappears because they no longer need it.
Related resources from the store:
- Tier 2 Reading Intervention Pack: Summarizing, Grades 6-8 | RTI MTSS — targeted Tier 2 practice for summarizing, built for small-group intervention in grades 6-8.
- Tier 2 Reading Intervention Bundle, Grades 6-8 | 4 Packs RTI MTSS — all four Tier 2 reading packs together, covering summarizing alongside main idea, inference, and vocabulary in context.