This document discusses how to summarize stories by describing characters, settings, and sequencing events. It provides an example story about a little green car named Polly that takes a road trip where she encounters various characters like a duck, frog, gingerbread men, and more. The events of her trip are sequenced and her interactions with each character are described. The main idea of the example story is determined to be that Polly, the little green car, takes a road trip.

1. Finding theMAIN IDEAUsing SEQUENCINGDESCRIBING characters and setting

2. Describing Things and People in A Story

3. Anything and everything has a description. The description might be long and detailed or short and sweet. When we describe people or things we should try to find and point out attributes that make the person or thing different from other people or things. Such as; a person’s color of hair, are they tall or short, do they wear glasses, what color are their eyes, the kind of clothes they wear. Or if describing an object, what about that object makes it different from other similar objects?

4. So let us try our hand at describing the object(s) in the photo to the right. In the top photo there is a cat playing with something on a clean white floor in a house. *The cat is small and so is probably young. *The cat is a yellowy/tan color with brown/black spots like a leopard. *It appears that the cat is a playful one and has a lot of energy. _______________________________ In the bottom photo there is a couple walking down a pathway away from us. *The man has on a light blue sweater, grey trousers, and a white shirt. He is using a cane. *The woman has a brown purse over her shoulder and is wearing; tan slacks and a white jacket. *They both have grey hair so we might guess they are an elderly couple out on a stroll.

5. Sometimes keeping a description of a person or character from a story in our mind as we read - helps us to follow the plot better. Following the plot better means we can find the Main Idea of the story easier.

6. Sometimes the Setting of the story changes as the events in the story move along in their Sequence. The Setting is where the story is taking place. When one character moves from his house to the beach then his house is the first Setting and the beach is the secondSetting.

7. A Setting can also be described. Many authors use VERY detailed descriptions in their stories to give their readers a particular feeling.The feelings could be scary or happy or sad or angry or curious. This is another way to better understand the story we are reading and that helps us to find the Main Idea.

8. Finding the Main Idea The MAIN IDEA of a story or a picture is WHAT IS IT ABOUT? When reading a story, the MAIN IDEA is what is the story about? Also, the MAIN IDEA of a photo is very similar, WHAT IS THE PHOTO ABOUT –OR WHAT IS IT OF? In the above photo the MAIN IDEA is racecars racing on a track.

9. See if you can find the MAIN IDEA of the following story: “The Little Green Car” Written and Illustrated By Edith Marie Wu

13. We will put the events of Polly’s road trip in order or in their proper Sequence. Let us stop here and review what has happened in the story so far. Polly takes a road trip. On her road trip she stops by a pond and speaks with a duck. After leaving the pond she drives through a dark forest and encounters a giant frog in the middle of the road. Next Polly speaks with two ginger-bread men dancing down the road.

18. We will put the events of Polly’s road trip in order or in their proper Sequence. 5) After meeting the two dancing ginger-bread men, Polly comes bumper-to-bumper with a little blue van. The blue van was speeding to find her friends. 6) The next event that happens to Polly on her road trip was racing with a speedy snail. The speedy snail’s name was Spitfire. 7) After waving to the speedy snail, Polly crosses a bridge and has a conversation with a purple sea-serpent. 8) The next thing that happens to Polly is that she pulls behind a horse and carriage on their way to a castle. 9) Polly is happy because her comfy garage is just over the next hill.

19. Making Connections Let us see if we can describe the characters of the story. Polly, the little green car. Duke the bright yellow duck. The giant green frog. If we can describe the characters in a story it will help us to understand the story better. If we try and remember the order in which the characters enter the story it will help us to understand the sequence of events. If we can describe the characters and place the events of the story in sequence it will help us to find the main idea of the story.

20. The two dancing brown and green ginger-bread men. The little blue van. Bright pink and yellow speedy snail named Spitfire.

21. The big purple sea-serpent under the bridge. The orange carriage and brown horse. The grey stone castle on the hill.

22. Let us finish our story and see if we can come up with the main idea.

25. We have described our characters. We have placed our events in the proper order -or- in sequence. And so what is the story “The Little Green Car” about? The MAIN IDEA of the story is: Polly, the little green car, takes a road trip.