Main Idea

1. Main Idea • G5.3R.C1.PO1 • Performance Objective • I can identify the main ideas and supporting details in expository text. What are main ideas and supporting details? created by Mr. Fox, ORE 5th grade

2. Essential Questions • What is main idea? How do you determine it in an expository text? • What is expository text? How do you use it to find information? • What are supporting details? How are they related to the main idea?

3. How can we tell what a paragraph or page is about? What do we look for? • First thing is we try to identify the main idea. But what is a main idea? • The main idea is the “BIG PICTURE” or what the writing is mainly about. • So how to we find the ‘Big Picture?”

4. We find the “big picture” by... Reading the material! Then, we should try to summarize the material into 1 or 2 sentences. What if we have trouble summarizing the material? We can look for supporting details.

5. What are supporting details? Think of it this way...If the main idea is the table top, than the supporting details would be the legs. A table can’t stand without legs, just like a main idea would not be supported (or make sense) without details. Main ideas (or topic sentences) can be found at the beginning, middle or end of the material. Supporting details can also be found anywhere in the text.

6. Let’s try...the topic sentence has been deleted? Armstrong made history on July 20, 1969. He was the commander of Apollo 11, the first space mission to land astronauts on the lunar surface. After their famous moonwalk, Armstrong and fellow astronaut Buzz Aldrin became icons in the history of science and space exploration. After Armstrong’s death was announced over the weekend, many people who work in science and government spoke proudly of his achievements. “Neil was among the greatest of American heroes,” President Barack Obama said in a statement. “When Neil stepped foot on the surface of the moon for the first time, he delivered a moment of human achievement that will never be forgotten.” First, try summarizing it. Then, look for details. Actual topic sentence from news article... What could the main idea be? On Saturday, American astronaut Neil Armstrong died at age 82. He was the first man to set foot on the moon. A hero and the first man to walk on the moon, Neil Armstrong, has died recently

7. Once again, the main idea of the passage has been removed. Can you figure it out? A medusoid is not real jellyfish. But it does act like one. So why did scientists make it? Jellyfish pump their way through water similarly to how human hearts pump to transport blood inside the body. Scientists hope that by understanding how the pumping mechanism of jellyfish works, they can learn more about human hearts. Using elastic material similar to what’s found in jellyfish, the researchers designed a thin membrane (a line of tissue or skin that covers certain organs or cells) with eight appendages to mimic the body of a jellyfish. They then arranged rat cells onto the membrane. They set a medusoid in a tank, shocked it with electricity, and watched it swim its way through the water, much like a real jellyfish. On your white boards, come up with a 1 or 2 sentence summary. Look for clues (details) of what the article is talking about. So what was the articles actual topic sentence....? Using silicone and rat heart muscles, scientists have created artificial jellyfish, nicknamed medusoids.

8. Great work! How about this one? The project, planned by Amr Mohamed, 19, sent zebra spiders—also called jumping spiders—into space to see if microgravity affects how the critters attack prey. Titled “Can You Teach an Old Spider New Tricks?” Mohamed’s project was one of the winners of the YouTube Space Lab competition—a contest asking teenagers to submit videos describing a scientific experiment that could be performed in orbit. Scientists at the International Space Station, which orbits Earth in outer space, are now running the experiments from the winning entries. What should we do first? Then we should...? Summarize Look for details in the story Make an educated guess, what was the newspapers main idea? Last month, an experiment about spiders designed by a teenager in Egypt blasted off into outer space.

9. Finding the main idea isn’t so hard. Let’s try another. In 1974, farmers in Xi’an (shee-an), China made a big discovery. Buried beneath the ground were thousands of life-size statues of warriors from ancient China. They had been untouched since their burial in the 3rd century B.C. Made of terracotta, a type of clay, the statues are known as the Terracotta Warriors or the Terracotta Army. Ten of the warriors are now on display in New York City. This is the maximum number of the statues that can be displayed outside of China at one time. Visitors to the exhibit at Discovery Times Square get to view the warriors up close—unlike in Xi’an, where the statues must be viewed from behind glass. On your boards, write what the main idea of this article is Scholastic New’s main idea was.... A 2,300-year-old set of sculpted Chinese warriors visits a New York museum What details support this main idea?

10. Last one “I came to them not so much as President as I do as a father and a husband,” Obama said. “My main task was to serve as a representative of the entire country and let them know that we are thinking about them at this moment, and we will continue to think about them each and every day.” Obama traveled to Aurora, Colorado, after a deadly shooting took place in a movie theater there last week. Twelve people were pronounced dead after the attack, and many more were injured. Police and rescue workers responded quickly. The suspected shooter was arrested, and medical personnel were able to help many who were hurt. Remember, if you can summarize the paragraph in 1 or 2 sentences, then you probably stated the main idea. So what’s the main idea? President Barack Obama flew to Colorado on Sunday to visit victims of a deadly shooting that occurred on Friday and their families. What details support this main idea?

11. Closure Main idea is the “big picture” or what something is mainly about. We can find the main idea by trying to summarize the writing and looking for supporting details. If writing didn’t have a main idea it might be very confusing as to what it is about. In your groups discuss the differences between supporting details and main idea, and where you might find the main idea.