South Dakota ELA 9-10.RI.2.b

ELAGrades 9–10Reading Informational Text

The Standard

Provide an objective summary of the text to support analysis.

South Dakota English Language Arts Standards (2025)

Teacher's field guide

What Students Need to Do: Students identify the central idea and the key points that develop it. They put those points in their own words without adding opinions, then use the summary to explain the text.
What Mastery Looks Like: A student writes a brief, accurate summary that keeps the author's meaning and leaves out side details. They can use a point from that summary to support their analysis.
Common Misconceptions: Students may copy sentences from the text instead of putting ideas in their own words. They may include an interesting but minor detail, add their opinion, or claim the author said something they did not.
How to Assess It: Give students a one-page article about later school start times. Ask: “Write a three-sentence neutral summary, then explain how one point in your summary helps you understand the article’s main idea.”

Lesson moves

Give pairs a printed article and three highlighters to mark its central idea, key details, and opinions before they write a summary.
Ask: “Which two details belong in a summary of this article, and which interesting detail should stay out? Why?”
Give groups six statement cards about an article to sort into key points, minor details, and opinions, then have them revise one card.
Bring a local news story about a school policy; students write a neutral summary and use it to explain the policy debate.

Free download

A ready-to-print activity worksheet aligned to 9-10.RI.2.b, with an answer key for the teacher on its own page. No account needed.

PDF, US Letter, prints cleanly in black and white.

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