1. “Quick-Fix Workshop” Communications Centre
How To Summarize
“Quick-Fix Workshop”
Communications Centre

2. What is a Summary?
A summary is a shortened version of an original text. It includes the thesis and major supporting points, and should reveal the relationship between the major points and the thesis.

3. How Long is a Summary?
It may be any length, from 25% of the original to one sentence.

4. What you Need A big, ugly, overwhelming text: to dissect and shrink.
A Hi-lighter: to locate the text’s important parts.
Paper: to write down the main point, purpose of the text, major points and documentation information.
A ruthless, but respectful attitude: to conquer the mess.

5. BEGIN

6. Step 1: Topic Locate the topic.
The topic is a word or phrase that says what the text is about.
Try to be as specific as possible about the topic.

7. Step 2: Purpose What is the purpose of the text.
Does it tell a story (narrate)? Inform? Persuade or raise readers' awareness of an issue?

8. Step 3: What is the Thesis?
Look for the thesis (what the author is saying about the topic).
Look first in the introduction, then in the conclusion; writers often write explicit thesis statements.
Write the thesis in your own words (and make sure it matches your sense of the author's purpose).

9. Step 4: Divisions in the Text
Look for the major divisions of the text. In your own words, summarize each division in one sentence.
(That may mean summarizing each paragraph, but often several paragraphs go together).
Make a list of all major points.

10. Step 5: Organizing Sentences
Work with the sentences you have created to produce a summary.
Be ruthless: a good summary is SUCCINCT (you may leave some information out -- as long as it is ‘extraneous’)
Make sure you reveal the relationships between the ideas. Are there contrasts or comparisons between some of the ideas?

11. REMEMBER Summaries are short restatements of a work's main points.
When writing a summary, be sure to record the work's major ideas.
Summaries condense a text's main ideas into a few concise sentences.
A summarized work is always much shorter than the original.
A summary of a work's thesis and supporting points should be written in your own words.

12. Tips
When summarizing, avoid examples, asides, analogies, and rhetorical strategies.
Only quote and paraphrase words and phrases that you feel you absolutely must to reproduce exactly the author's or authors' full meaning.
Keep in mind that your summary must fairly represent the author's or authors' original ideas.

13. Checklist Reread your source until you fully understand it.
Write a one sentence restatement of the source's main idea without looking at the source.
Use the text’s main idea as your summary's topic sentence.
Pull out the text’s main ideas.
Write the summary in your own words. Avoid looking at your source while writing your summary.
If you must include some of the source's original words and phrases, quote and paraphrase accurately.
Document the source's author, title, date of publication and any other important citation information.

14. The Difference Between Paraphrasing and Summarizing
To paraphrase means to express someone else's ideas in your own language. To summarize means to distill only the most essential points of someone else's work.
Think about how much of the detail from your source is relevant. If all your reader needs to know is the ‘bare bones’, then summarize.