4.7.D

ELA4th GradeThe student responds to an increasingly challenging variety of sources that are read, heard, or viewed.

The Standard

retell, paraphrase, or summarize texts in ways that maintain meaning and logical order

Texas Essential Knowledge and Skills for English Language Arts and Reading

Teacher's field guide

What This Standard Means

What Students Need to Do

Students explain a text in their own words at different levels of detail. They select key ideas and events, preserve the author’s meaning, and present information in a sensible order.

What Mastery Looks Like

Students can recount key events, restate a passage in their own words, and give a brief summary. Their response keeps the original meaning and presents ideas in a clear sequence.

Common Misconceptions

Students may copy whole sentences instead of using their own words. They may include minor details, omit the main idea, change the meaning, or place events out of order.

How to Assess It

Give students a short paragraph and ask them to write a two-sentence summary that includes the main idea and events in order.

Lesson moves

Ways to Teach It

  1. Give pairs event cards from a familiar story to arrange in order, then use the cards to give an oral retelling.

  2. After reading a short article, ask students to write which details belong in a summary and explain why.

  3. Play Summary Sort by having teams label sentence cards as main idea, key detail, minor detail, or opinion.

  4. Students summarize a school announcement for an absent classmate, keeping the needed information in the order it was presented.

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