Implied Main Idea

Day 1: Stated vs. Implied

Review with students that a stated main idea is where the main idea is actually written down in the selection you are reading. In groups of 4 or 5 students match up the paragraph with the correct stated main idea. Once they match them up correctly have them underline the sentence in the paragraph that states the main idea. Ask students about where they can find the main idea. Is it always the first sentence? The last? How you do you know that sentence is the right sentence? (ex. Answer: Because the sentence gives an overall statement about the entire paragraph.) If that sentence is the main idea, what are the rest of the sentences? (Supporting details)

Introduce Implied Main Idea Put up overhead of different pictures that revolve around a central theme. See if students can guess the implied main idea from all the pictures. Explain that to find the implied main idea you have to infer from the pictures what it is all about. You can’t just use one picture to get your answer, you need to look at all the pictures together. Explain the 4 clues to help find implied main idea. 1. Read or examine the passage 2. Identify the topic or theme the passage it about. 3. Check the details to be sure they support the topic or main idea. 4. Reread the passage to double check that the theme matches the supporting details.

What’s the difference between stated main idea and implied main idea? (Stated main idea is where the main idea is written in the passage and you can find it. Implied Main idea is when the main idea is not written in the passage and you have to infer or figure it out based on the supporting details that are given.

Day 2: Implied Main Idea

Using pictures cut out from magazines each pair of students will take a picture and determine the implied main idea. On a piece of paper they will glue their pictures and below write their implied main idea. Then, the students follow up their main idea with 3 or 4 supporting details that they find from what they see in the picture. Have them brainstorm ideas before they start writing. Any implied main idea will work as long as it goes with the picture and they can back it up with reasonable details. This might be a nice thing to hang in the halls if you like. Day 3: http://www.daltonstate.edu/faculty/mnielsen/implied_main_idea_practice_2.htm (This is also on my website if you would rather just go there)

On computers students will read passages and determine the implied main idea. You can do this individually and take an additional grade or students can work in pairs again. Students will write down the implied main idea for each passage. Once they have gotten as far as time allows they can check their answers. They can’t check their answers each time because it shows all the answers at once when you click on ‘go to key’.

Discuss with class which ones they got wrong and why they think they got that one wrong. What problems are you running into when you try to think of the implied main idea?

Day 4:

In groups of 2 or 3 students will ‘mime’ a scenario to the rest of the class and the class will have to take all the clues and figure out the implied main idea. The implied main idea is up to the teacher’s discretion, so take a look at the scenarios before hand to figure out where you want the students to go with each one.

First, hand out the scenario to the group. They are to read it and as a group decide on the implied main idea. Next, they can begin to decide how they will ‘mime’ it out. The groups can use props but cannot speak or write words on anything. Students should be coming up with good actions that clearly follow the scenario. They also may add more to the scenario (something that might happen before or after) that still follows the implied main idea.

Day 5: Assessment