Close Encounters II

Close Encounters II

Pencil and paperOnline interactive
Overview
Using this Resource
Connecting to the Curriculum
Marking Student Responses
Working with Students
Further Resources
This task is about finding the main idea of the text.
A teacher read "Close Encounters" to her class. Then she asked, 'What's the main idea?' 
 
Some students thought the main idea was the importance of learning about Māori culture. Here is what two of them said:
Amber: "Ramari begins on page 3 by talking mostly about her Māori culture. Since I know that the beginning part of an article often tells us something about the main idea, I think the main idea must be her Māori culture."
James: "Ramari talks about extremely important ideas in Māori culture such as whakapapa and kaitiakitanga."
 
Some students thought the main idea was that Ramari's cultural and scientific backgrounds both influence her work. Here is what two of them said:
Rachel: "Every time Ramari talks about studying the sea lions and whales she always adds some sort of comment about her Māori culture. Like on page 4 when she talks about counting sea lions, she then says, in the last paragraph, that the ancient skills of her ancestors help her to do it."
Tom: "At the top of page 4 Ramari says that traditional waiata and scientific observation and statistics are equally important to her understanding of the world. This is a really big clue because the rest of the article focuses on Ramari talking about her Māori culture in connection with scientific observation and statistics."
 
Some students thought the main idea was the conservation of sea lions and whales. Here is what two of them said: 
Sam: "Almost all the article is about studying these animals and about how whaling nearly destroyed the whale population. This is what conservation is all about."
Katie: "I've learnt heaps about counting sea lions and how to find out what they've eaten. I've also learnt about building up photo databases of whales, and about the slaughter of whales for their blubber."
 

Question

a) Select the names of the two students you think are right about the main idea. (Choose one option)

    • Amber and James

    • Rachel and Tom

    • Sam and Katie

Question 2Change answer

b) Say why you think they are right.
Task administration: 
This task can be completed with pencil and paper or online (with some auto marking). 
 
Equipment:
  • Remind the students that the main idea is what the author wants readers to understand is important and valued in the text as a whole.
  • Explain that Part a) assesses if they understand what the main idea of the text is.
  • Explain that Part b) assesses if they can justify, or give reasons, why they think their choice of main idea is right.
  • This task can be done individually or in groups. Responses might be discussed by the teacher and a student, or within larger groups. Group discussion has the advantage of giving students opportunities to consider others' ideas and to practise justifying their own.
  • Close Encounters I is a level 4 main idea resource using the same text.
  • Close Encounters might be read by students over a couple of sessions, perhaps in structured parts, or be read to students as a shared text, or be read with students in a guided manner (either as a whole class or in small groups).
Level:
5
Curriculum info: 
English, Making meaning, Reading
Key Competencies: 
Thinking
Keywords: 
comprehension, main idea, connected, think critically, evaluating, Māori scientist, kaitiaki, whakapapa, marine animals
Description of task: 
This comprehension task assesses student ability to find the main idea of a transactional text about a Māori naturalist/scientist. Students are asked to read a text, identify the main idea from three choices provided, and then justify why they think their choice is right.
Curriculum Links: 
Links to the Literacy Learning Progressions for Reading:
This resource helps to identify students’ ability to:
  • use comprehension strategies
  • evaluate and integrate ideas and information
as described in the Literacy Learning Progressions for Reading at: http://www.literacyprogressions.tki.org.nz/The-Structure-of-the-Progressions.
Learning Progression Frameworks
This resource can provide evidence of learning associated with
Acquiring and using information and ideas in informational texts, sets 5-7
within the Reading Learning Progressions Frameworks.
Read more about the Learning Progressions Frameworks.
Answers/responses: 

This resource was trialled by 32 students in July and September 2006. The trial involved small groups of Y8, 9, 10, and 11 students across 4 primary schools and 1 secondary school.

a) The correct response is Rachel and Tom's main idea: Ramari's cultural and scientific backgrounds both influence her work.
b) The text contains enough details relating to Ramari's Māori culture and her scientific background to justify Rachel and Tom's main idea of: Ramari's cultural and scientific backgrounds both influence her work.

The text does not contain enough conservation-related details to justify the choice of Sam and Katie's main idea: the conservation of sea lions and whales.

The text contains too many details relating to Ramari's scientific background to justify the choice of Amber and James' main idea: the importance of learning about Māori culture.
Diagnostic and formative information: 
Data collected from the trial prompted the researchers to ask themselves the following questions about students who chose the importance of learning about Māori culture:

  • Did students allow an area of personal interest or commitment to dominate their reading? For example one trial student, when justifying his choice of this response wrote, "I think Ramari is right, your culture is a very important part of your life."
  • Were students overly influenced by the first and/or last sentences of the text? For example, one trial student wrote, "I think they [Amber and James] are [right] because at the beginning of the article it tells us about whakapapa and Rangi and papatüānuku." And another wrote, "…because at the end of the article it says it's our turn to become their kaitiaki."

Data collected from the trial prompted the researchers to ask themselves the following questions about students who chose the conservation of sea lions and whales:

  • Did students rely too heavily on the number of specialist science words about sea lions and whales? This text contains a large number of technical vocabulary items about sea lions and whales, and students making this response may have used this high number, and possibly also the placement of these words throughout the text, to infer the main idea was the conservation of sea lions and whales. However, if this was the main idea, the text would have included a greater number of words that occur around the topic of conservation. Conservation-related words and phrases that do occur in the text include: environment; species; (p.3); health of the…environment (p.4); population survey (p.4); wholesale slaughter; kaitiaki (p.9). But conservation-related words and phrases that readers might expect to find in a text primarily concerned with conservation, but which are absent from this text, include: conservation; decreasing/increasing population; numbers; endangered species; extinct; rare; native; ecosystem; predator; diversity; habitat.
  • Did students interpret a particular meaning that was only loosely based on what was written in the text? For example, one wrote when justifying their choice of main idea, "Because lots of the story was about…saying how small the numbers are", when in fact there is no mention of small populations. And another wrote, "Now there's only about 40 southern right whales left on the island", when in fact the text simply states that 40 southern right whales were swimming/playing off the coast of Campbell island.
  • Were students overly influenced by the details about conservation because they knew conservation to be a hugely important topic? For example, one student appeared to allow her prior knowledge to dominate her reading when she wrote, "The article tells us how important whales are to the world...we (us humans) need to do something about it [the low whale population]."

Data collected from the trial prompted the researchers to ask themselves the following questions about students who chose Ramari's cultural and scientific backgrounds both influence her work:

  • Did students understand that the two groups of details were linked, that they were not entirely discrete, and that it was their combination that gave the text its main idea? For example one student who had this understanding wrote, "Basically, on every page she told us how some part of her Māori culture was significant to the work she likes doing." Another wrote, "I think they're right because the article isn't just about Māori culture or the conservation of sea lions and whales, but centres around both together." And another noted the significance of Ramari saying, "From childhood, I've learnt traditional waiata that use images from nature to explain all sorts of things. But scientific observation and statistics are just as important in my understanding of the world" (p.4). This student wrote that, "It [this piece of text] "talks about how both traditional waiata and scientific observation are equally important to her… It sums everything up about the main idea."
Next steps: 

For students having difficulty using vocabulary in the text to find the main idea, i.e., students who chose the conservation of sea lions and whales:

  • Ask the students to first list words that they might expect to find in a text about conservation. For example, conservation; decreasing/increasing population; numbers; endangered species; extinct; rare; native habitat; ecosystem; predator; diversity; shrinking habitat. Then ask them to search a text for these words. You could go back to the Close Encounters text if you want the students to prove that conservation is not its main idea. Alternatively, "A Tragedy at Sea" (the text immediately after Close Encounters in Connected 3, 2004) could be used to support students in analysing a text focused on the conservation of a species. This text might also feature the kinds of words the students have listed.
  • Introduce collocations, meaning groups of two or three words that typically occur together. It is important that students learn to use them because a student's English language fluency is believed to be strongly linked to their ability to automatically retrieve and use these fixed or semi-fixed clusters of words. Conservation-related collocations in "A tragedy at Sea" include: endangered species; rare species (p.11); in the wild; DNA samples; closely related; build up a picture; serious drop (p.12); shallow coastal waters; fishing nets; run-off pollution; easy to recognise; metres in length (p. 13); sea floor; highly intelligent; low birth rate; natural causes; important fact; human activities; population is dwindling (p. 14). When students are searching a text for details, remind them that they are not simply looking for isolated words, but clusters of words that "go together". ("go together" is a collocation.)

For students who chose Ramari's cultural and scientific backgrounds both influence her work but did not make any reference to the two groups of details being combined to convey the main idea:

  • Even though these students chose the correct main idea, they may have difficulty finding the main idea independently. Instead of recognising the details as combining to convey the main idea, they may regard the details as distinct categories that each convey a main idea. They must recognise that it is not enough to find groups of details. They also need to know how those details might go together.
  • Students having difficulty combining groups of details may be able to independently find and group details, but at various stages during a guided lesson, you may need to support them by modelling the thinking process involved in combining them. For example, "so far, we've got quite a few details about Ramari's Māori culture, and quite a few about her work as a scientist. How might those two groups go together to make the main idea? ...might the main idea be something about both of them together…because Ramari often talks about them together, doesn't she? …And it seems like she's giving them equal importance….".
Further information about the main idea can be found in this article: What's the main idea? 
  • Duffy, G. (2003). Explaining reading: A resource for teaching concepts, skills, and strategies. New York, NY: The Guilford Press.
  • Ministry of Education. (2006). Effective literacy practice in years 5 to 8. Wellington: Learning Media.