Lester R. Brown discusses several environmental challenges facing global food security in his book, including soil erosion, aquifer depletion, and rising temperatures. In chapters 1 through 9, he notes that soil erosion from deforestation and overfarming is leading to dust bowls and dust storms, degrading the land's ability to grow food. Additionally, overpumping of groundwater aquifers to irrigate crops is causing their decline and eventual depletion in many regions. Climate change is also a looming threat, as rising temperatures melt ice sheets and glaciers, potentially disrupting food production and raising sea levels to inundate low-lying agricultural lands.

1. Summary Writing
E. Siler

2. Topic
• Purpose: To explain something in such a way
as to provide background information about it
so that a reasonable opinion question can be
formed.
• Audience: Someone who has not read the
book, but someone who is intelligent.
• Focus: This is a teaching summary --- your
purpose is to explain something to someone.

3. Possible Topics to Consider
• Using information from the book summarize
what Lester R. Brown says about one of these
concepts:
• > national security; indirect costs; food
security; food bubbles; deforestation;
shrinkage/shortage of irrigation water; aquifers;
dust storms; soil erosion; dust bowls; melting
ice; land acquisitions; environmental refugees;
rising seas; demographic fatigue; LEDs and CFLs;
geothermal energy; tidal power; wind energy;
solar energy.

4. Parameters
• 450 wpm
• Written out, but delivered orally.
• Must involve ALL the material that Brown
mentions about the subject up to chapter 9.
• Do not just restate what he says on one page.
• Should primarily be in your own words, with
careful use of quoting from him.

5. Continued
• Should use definite signal phrase markers such as
“In Chapter X”
• Should mark direct quotes with direct quote
markers such as “What he calls” or “As he points
out” or “as he puts it.”
• Should make it clear where he borrows
information from a source by attributing that
source (Ex: The failed states index).
• Because it is descriptive and explanatory, should
be mostly in the present tense except when
presenting historical information.

6. Next Steps
• 1. Find a way to make an MP3 using either
your cellphone or your laptop.
• 2. Choose a topic. If you don’t like the list of
topics and have another, you need to contact
me.
• 3. Draft a 450-word teaching summary
explaining your topic and have it ready for
Friday.