paraphrasing and summarizing practice

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Summarizing worksheets & activities.

Summarizing is one of those skills that may seem very easy to a teacher but can be difficult for students who have not been properly taught how to summarize. For many years I did not even teach my seventh and eighth grade students how to summarize. I would just ask them to summarize texts and then get mad at them when they failed to produce quality summaries. I was wrong in doing this. Now I always teach my students how to write summaries.

Additionally, as per the Common Core State Standards, summaries should not contain opinions, background knowledge, or personal information; rather, a summary should be entirely text based. After years of learning to make connections between the text and themselves, students must be retrained to keep themselves out of their writing in regards to summaries. Teaching this skill surely warrants some of your class time.

Here are some resources that I used in my classroom to teach my students how to summarize. I hope that you find this page useful:

Summarizing Common Core State Standards

120 comments, kowsar seyfudin mahmax.

Thank you very much

I want to express my gratitude for the work you have put into this site.

I have used your site for students for almost a decade now and they have not disappointed once.

Thank you for coming back!

I really appreciate these worksheets and all the worksheets you have published. I work as a volunteer for a literacy group, and we don’t have many resources at this level. I was an SLP so I have had no professional experience as a language arts teacher. These resources allow me to teach better and not have to create items from scratch.

thank you it was informative.

Alphonsa Anis

Thanks it was extremely helpful.

Absolutely fabulous. I’m using them for two employees who are struggling to summarise information. Very, very helpful – thank you.

Hello, can these great worksheets be linked to Google Classroom? Also, how can I have my students access the online assessments? Thank you.

There is a Google Classroom button on the title slide of each online assignment. Press this button to assign it. Google Classroom integration is pretty thin right now, but I’m hoping that they open up their platform more sometime soon!

Thank you, Mr. Morton, for sharing your tips and worksheets for summary teaching and writing practices. Very useful!

Some great activities, really helpful. One thing I want to point out is that shinobi-no-mono is NOT Chinese – this is Japanese. And in the text the characters given are Japanese, NOT Chinese. This is quite a big oversight. As language teachers we need to be aware of different languages.

Thank you. I appreciate the insight.

I want summary and practice sheets for grade 6

Please send me an answer key for the summarizing test.

Acutually 忍の者 isnt chinese the word の is japanses, while in chinese and japanese they call ninja , 忍者. Other than that this is some really good stuff to study my summary from

great material. I´ve been looking for this type of easy to read/ understand material for a long time.

Would it be possible to have the solutions to the test?

Thanks in advance.

Diane Thomas

These are wonderful!Thank you so much!

Thanks a lot .

JANINE RAINES

DO YOU HAVE THE ANSWER KEY TO THE SUMMARIZING TEST?

Mrs. Robinson

Hello, I’m looking for the answer guide for the Summarizing test, please advise if it is available?

Loan Nguyen

Thanks for your sharing. Invaluable resources for teachers. It would be highly appreciated if you can send me the key for the summary test.

Is there an answer sheet for the summarizing test?

EXCELLENT worksheets!

Like many of the above comments, I was hoping that there was an answer key for the summarizing test.

I’m pleased that today is the day that I can finally say, “ Here you go .”

Thank you so much!!

Thank you very much. Bless you!

Thank you, Mr. Morton, for sharing these materials. Indeed this is of great help in my class.

The materials are awesome!! I’d like to separate them to two levels of my students. I’m teaching international students, the comparasion of the good and bad summary really works a lot. I really appriciate for your sharing. However, could you share the summarising answer keys as well? That would help me a lot. Thank you!

Would you consider making something for the 4th & 5th grade level? The examples were all very helpful, but many of my students read below grade level. Thank you again! Jill C.

Thanks from Toronto! Great help for ESL classes here.

Thanks so much from Istanbul! Kids loved it and saved me so much precious precious time

saida merad

Thank you for your valuable help!

Thank you for putting all the material together.

I couldn’t find the answers for the Summarizing Test. They will surely save me some time. Please send them to me, or let me know where I can find them. Thank you so much,

Did you get the answer sheet?

Thank you for all the great materials to use, they will prove to be a great resource!

I was wondering if you would mind pointing out the source from which you pulled the information about ninjas for your worksheet on them. I just wanted to make sure I had the right information because from the bit of research that I pulled up, I see that both in history (concept / existence) and etymology, ninjas are Japanese. The Japanese use kanji, which are essentially Chinese characters, and is only one of the three different “alphabet” sets they use for written communication. So words like “shinobi” and “shinobi no mono” are all Japanese in origin, but written using Chinese characters and not really associated with Chinese culture. This is especially true because “no mono” is a Japanese phrase. Please let me know if there is a source that does say otherwise, so that I can have all the information. Thank you again!

Hello. I pulled that content from a Wikipedia page a long time ago. I’m no expert on the subject. I was just writing a worksheet that I hope would interest students.

These worksheets are helpful but the commenter above is correct, none of these words are or have ever been Chinese. “Shinobi” was in Japanese poems in the 8th century, not Chinese. Shinobi was the Chinese reading of the characters, but it was always a Japanese word. It might be helpful to fix this worksheet to avoid presenting incorrect information to students.

What is the answer key for summary test please?

Thanks a million for this Mr. Morton. This lesson will help me and my students understand summarizing better. God bless your sir!

Thank you so much for helpful material

Brian Samson

What a phenomenal effort you’ve done in putting together all these. Appreciate your ideas. Fabulous!

How amazing to come across your Summarising resouces with explicit instructions. Your comments about teaching the students how to effectively summarise was the most important fact. This in turn forced me to reflect on my own teaching. Thank you for the step by step instructions, they were very valuable. Have you posted any other reading strategy hints?

Sure, I’ve posted them all around this site. Feel free to explore a bit.

What’s the reading level for summary worksheet 3?

Can I get answers for summarizing test about Gutenberg

It is an awesome sight.I got to now today from where the school gives us topics in worksheets.Very useful,but one problems that we don’t get the answers of the questions so that we can check and correct our answers

Mary Jane Dela Cerna

Good day Mr. Morton 😀 what is the answer keys for the summary test? I am not sure in my answer 😀

Wow, just wanted to thank you for your hard work and generosity to publish them for everybody. Thank you so much.

I was studying for an exam and couldn’t find enough information on summarizing. I was very excited when I found your site. It was very helpful.Thanks a million!

A terrific resource. Thank you so much for sharing. I came across your site as I was looking for help with teaching summarising – no need to look any further! Powerpoint and practice sheets, examples …. awesome.

Gracie Alexander

Is there an answer key for the Test?

Kristen Moore

What an incredible site! Thank you for sharing your resources and ideas. Especially the Summary power point. I’ve been struggling to get my students to differentiate between a summary and a list of details. This will help so much!

Amy Gartland

I just discovered this site today. I teach high school ELL and was looking for good nonfiction texts that were accessible for my students. I will definitely be looking around some more and plan on using material in my lessons this week!

This was VERY helpful. Even for a university student who needed a refresher!

An answer key for the Summary would be helpful if provided. And also a whole passage summary, not just the summary for each paragraph.

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• Paraphrase Online

Paraphrasing and Summarizing Exercises with Answers

Paraphrasing and Summarizing are two skills that are highly useful for writers. With these two techniques, writers can get help creating their content and providing it to their readers in an easy-to-peruse way.

However, if you happen to be new to the field of writing, you could be a little unaware and untrained in both these skills. But don’t worry. Everyone starts out as a beginner.

In this post, we’re going to be looking at some  paraphrasing and summarizing  exercises along with their answers and explanations. By following along, you’ll get a good idea about how you can use these techniques in your own capacity.

Let’s begin!

What is Paraphrasing and Summarizing?

Before we get to the exercises, let’s digress a little and understand what paraphrasing and summarization actually are.

Let’s start with paraphrasing.

Paraphrasing  is the process in which a particular piece of content is reworded and rephrased in such a way that it looks different from its original version but it has the same meaning and context.

A simple example of paraphrasing would be to change “John likes his cat” to “John adores his feline pet”. Paraphrasing can be as slight as merely changing some words in the text, or it can be as drastic as fully changing the tone, structure, order, and words of the content.

On the other hand,  Summarizing  is the process in which a piece of content is shrunk and shortened to about one-tenth of its original size. In this shortened version, the main idea and concept of the content is provided.

Summarization is usually used by authors and writers when they want to give a brief outline of a book or article to their readers.

Now that we’ve looked at the definitions of both, let’s move ahead to look at some exercises.

Paraphrasing Exercises (with Answers)

The main purpose of providing these exercises along with their answers is to help you understand what these techniques look like when they are implemented. Since we have explained their core definition above, you can try and work along the exercises to improve your skills a little as well.

Related:  Difference Between Paraphrasing And Rephrasing

Paraphrasing Exercise # 1:

Here is a sample paragraph that we will be paraphrasing as an exercise. We’ll write the paragraph alone first, and then provide the answer after a brief explanation.

Sample Paragraph:

"John could not find the butter in his fridge. He went to buy some from the store. On coming back, he saw his cat sitting on the floor, smacking its lips. There was some yellow stuff smeared all around its face. Thus, John solved the mystery of the missing butter."

So, as we mentioned earlier, paraphrasing can be done simply and sparingly, or it can be done drastically.

One of the primary and basic ways of paraphrasing is to simply change some words in the provided content with their synonyms. This is, we reiterate, a very basic level of paraphrasing, and it is often very easy to see through it.

So, for this first exercise, we are going to be doing only that level of paraphrasing as a way to illustrate how it looks like.

Here is what the above paragraph looks like when paraphrased:

Paraphrased Paragraph:

"John could not locate the butter in the refrigerator. He went to purchase some from the shop. On coming back, he observed his cat sitting on the ground, licking its lips. There was some yellow material smeared all around its face. Hence, John solved the mystery of the missing butter."

While we are on this discussion, it will also be salubrious to understand that when changing words with their synonyms for the purpose of paraphrasing, you have to be careful that you pick those that don’t mess up the context and intent of the lines.

Paraphrasing Exercise # 2:

Moving on, let’s look at another paraphrasing exercise. Here is the paragraph that we will be using for this one:

"John’s cat got lost in the forest. He went looking for it in the night time. He heard some movement in one of the bushes. He put his hand in and felt the fur. He pulled the thing out, thinking it to be his cat. After coming home, he realized it was an angry raccoon."

We mentioned in the last exercise that the basic level of paraphrasing is to change some of the words in the given text with their synonyms. And we also mentioned how that sort of paraphrasing can be easily detected.

So, for writers who want to paraphrase something in such a way that it does not resemble its original form a lot, there’s a step further that they can go, and that is to change the sentence structures + phrases.

Essentially, by changing the phrases used in the content as well as the arrangement of the sentences, the overall look of the paraphrased piece looks very different. If someone wants to go even ahead of that, they can shuffle the sentence  order  as well.

Considering this type of ‘extensive’ paraphrasing, here is the answer to the paragraph given above:

"John’s cat went missing in the forest. He went to search for it when it was dark. He discerned some movement in the hedge. After putting his hand inside it, he felt some fur. Thinking that it was his cat, he pulled the animal out. It was only after coming home that he realized that it was a frustrated raccoon."

Read more: How And Why to Paraphrase Your Content?

Summarizing Exercises (with Answers)

Now that we have looked at the paraphrasing exercises, let’s move on to look at some for summarizing.

Just as we’ve looked at two types of paraphrasing above, we’ll also look at two different types of summarizing.

Actually, it’ll be better if we explain those two types before getting to the exercises.

Basically, there are  two types of summaries . One of them is called  extractive  and the other is called  abstractive .

In extractive summarization, the summary of a piece of content is generated merely by taking out some sentences from it and joining them together. This is usually the type of summaries that you get from automated tools.

When extractive summaries are created, there is no effort to understand the actual meaning and context of the text. Rather, the purpose is only to take some lines from it and join them together in such a way that they make sense.

On the other hand, abstractive summaries are those that are written using a completely new and different set of words, phrases and sentences than the content (that is being summarized). As opposed to extractive summarization, abstractive summarization involves understanding the meaning and context of the text, and then creating a completely new summary that features all those concepts and ideas.

Summarizing Exercise # 1 (Extractive)

In order to demonstrate and explain extractive summarization, we’re going to first write a paragraph here and then provide its summary afterwards:

Sample paragraph:

"John’s car broke down. He stopped by the road side and screamed at people to stop and help him. But no one stopped for him. He continued howling and howling for hours. People kept driving by. After getting tired, he picked up a sheet and wrapped it around himself. Then, he started spinning on his spot. He grew dizzy. He kept spinning and spinning until he fell asleep."

Now, since we have to use the “extractive” summarization technique here, we’ll create the summary using the lines and sentences used in the content itself.

"John’s car broke down. But no one stopped for him. Then, he started spinning on the spot. He kept spinning and spinning until he fell asleep."

Summarizing Exercise # 2 (Abstractive)

For this exercise, we will use the same para that we did above. However, the technique used for the summarization will be different.

Since we will be using the abstractive technique here, the summary will be created using different words and phrases as the original.

"John’s vehicle went phut. But, no one stopped their car to help him. After he was tired, he made himself dizzy by spinning and then went to sleep."

So, that’s about it.

If you were a little confused about paraphrasing and summarization techniques, hopefully you’re a little more confident about them now.

These skills can come in handy for writers in a lot of different situations. If you don’t have the hang of them already, you should try and get it as quick as you can.

Module 2: Reading Strategies

Summarizing and paraphrasing, learning objectives.

• Summarize a passage of reading
• Paraphrase a passage of reading

Have you ever heard, “the best way to learn something is to teach it to someone else”?

Writing a summary of a source is a very similar process to teaching someone the content—but in this case, the student you’re teaching is yourself.

Summarizing , or condensing someone else’s ideas and putting it into your own shortened form, allows you to be sure that you’ve accurately captured the main idea of the text you’re reading. When reading, summarizing is helpful for checking your understanding of a longer text and remembering the author’s main ideas. When writing, summarizing is critical when reviewing, writing an abstract, preparing notes for a study guide, creating an annotated bibliography, answering essay questions, recording results of an experiment, describing the plot of a fictional work or film, or writing a research paper.

How to Write Summary Statements

Use these processes to help you write summary statements:

• Underline important information and write keywords in the margin.
• Record ideas using a two-column note-taking system. Record questions you have about the text concepts in the left column and answers you find in the reading in the right column.
• Identify how concepts relate to what you already know.
• Add examples and details

For retaining key ideas as you read, write a summary statement at the end of each paragraph or section. For capturing the major ideas of the entire work, write a summary paragraph (or more) that describes the entire text.

Tips for Summary

For longer, overall summary projects that capture an entire reading, consider these guidelines for writing a summary:

• A summary should contain the main thesis or standpoint of the text, restated in your own words. (To do this, first find the thesis statement in the original text.)
• A summary is written in your own words. It contains few or no quotes.
• A summary is always shorter than the original text, often about 1/3 as long as the original.  It is the ultimate fat-free writing. An article or paper may be summarized in a few sentences or a couple of paragraphs. A book may be summarized in an article or a short paper. A very large book may be summarized in a smaller book.
• A summary should contain all the major points of the original text , and should ignore most of the fine details, examples, illustrations or explanations.
• The backbone of any summary is formed by crucial details (key names, dates, events, words and numbers). A summary must never rely on vague generalities.
• If you quote anything from the original text, even an unusual word or a catchy phrase, you need to put whatever you quote in quotation marks (” “).
• A summary must contain only the ideas of the original text. Do not insert any of your own opinions, interpretations, deductions or comments into a summary.

You can view the transcript for “Summarizing” here (opens in new window) .

Paraphrasing

Paraphrasing is the act of putting an author’s ideas into your own words. When reading, paraphrasing is helpful for checking your understanding of what you read as well as remembering what you read. When writing, paraphrasing is an important skill to have when constructing a research paper and incorporating the ideas of others alongside your own.

Click to view the transcript for “Paraphrasing” here (opens in new window) .

paraphrasing : rewriting a passage of text in your own words

• Modification, adaptation, and original content. Provided by : Lumen Learning. License : CC BY: Attribution
• PQRST Script. Provided by : Lethbridge College. Located at : http://www.lethbridgecollege.net/elearningcafe/index.php/pqrst-script . Project : eLearning Cafe. License : CC BY: Attribution
• Summarizing. Provided by : Excelsior College. Located at : https://owl.excelsior.edu/orc/what-to-do-after-reading/summarizing/ . License : CC BY: Attribution
• Why Use Quotes?. Authored by : The News Manual. Provided by : Media Helping Media. Located at : http://www.mediahelpingmedia.org/training-resources/journalism-basics/659-how-to-use-quotes-in-news-stories-and-features . License : CC BY-NC-SA: Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike
• How to Write an A-plus Summary of a Text. Authored by : Owen M. Williamson. Provided by : The University of Texas at El Paso. Located at : http://utminers.utep.edu/omwilliamson/engl0310/summaryhints.htm . License : Public Domain: No Known Copyright

Want to create or adapt books like this? Learn more about how Pressbooks supports open publishing practices.

Paraphrasing and summarizing

Part 3: Chapter 9

Questions to consider

A. What are the qualities of a strong summary?

B. What, when, and why do scholars summarize?

A summary is a condensed version of a longer text. Summaries of different lengths are useful in research writing because they provide readers with an explanation of supporting material. The first step in writing a good summary is to do a thorough reading of the text. Even the strongest readers sometimes find very new, very complex, or very dense work difficult to process.

Read for comprehension by remaining engaged. Continuously ask and answer a few basic questions.

A. What is the unique point here?

B. Which ideas come from the author; which material is support cited from other sources?

C. How are the ideas connected (e.g. cause and effect? chronologically?)?

D. What is the likely conclusion?

Three steps to producing a strong summary

• Read for main ideas;
• articulate the primary message without relying too heavily on the original language (including vocabulary and sentence structure); then,
• draft a paraphrase that includes a citation giving credit to the source in the appropriate format.

Other summarizing guidelines

A quote is a direct restatement of the exact words from the original source. Using three or more words exactly as they appear in the original source is a quote. In contrast, a paraphrase is a restatement of the information or point of the original source. Paraphrases and quotes must always accompanied by a proper citation of the source.

Long and direct quotations are discouraged in research writing, especially in the STEM fields. Material incorporated from an outside source should be paraphrased in almost all situations. The use of direct quotes should be limited to when

• the exact words of the source are important, particularly with technical language, terms, or very specific word choices; or
• the author or speaker of the original language is uniquely powerful.

In higher level summaries, source information is generally restricted to the citation; it is not necessary to mention the author or their credentials, the article title, or the publication name in the summary. This is contrary to what many students learn in earlier writing instruction.

Following the order of the original source information is often tempting, as it seems well organized and effective (indeed, it has been published). However, summary writers may omit what they do not need and reorganize material to suit their purposes. These efforts can contribute to the freshness of the paraphrase when they are implemented well.

Finally, research writers must only summarize from an original source (the primary source ) and NOT the reference material (the secondary sources ) included for support.

Exercise #1 – Practice Summary

Read this discussion section from Does international work experience pay off? The relationship between international work experience, employability and career success: A 30-country, multi-industry study and then respond to the questions below.

1 Adopting a HCT perspective (Becker, 1993, 2008; Tan, 2014), we proposed and found that IWE, as an investment in human capital, is associated with higher perceived external employability, which in turn is positively related to promotions and subjective financial success. 2 Although this mediated relationship was not moderated by economic freedom as hypothesised, supplementary analyses that differentiated between short-term and long-term IWE however showed that, in countries with low economic freedom, the indirect relationships between short-term IWE and career success indicators through perceived external employability were more pronounced. 3 The present study thus highlights the role of perceived external employability as a core mediator underlying the IWE–career success link. 4 Including promotions and subjective financial success as indicators of both OCS and SCS provides a more nuanced picture of how IWE relates to career success. 5 Although the study focuses on specific indicators of OCS and SCS, the empirical findings have greater generalisability compared to much of research that precedes our study given that our results hold across a large-scale sample of employees in four broad occupational groups from 30 countries and more than 20 industries. 6 While empirical evidence overrepresents countries from the Anglo, Latin European and/or Germanic European clusters, our study incorporates a sample that includes countries from all GLOBE clusters (House et al., 2004) and thus many countries that have never been researched with respect to international assignments and career outcomes. [1]

HCT: human capital theory suggests education and training contribute to a person’s earning power IWE: international work experience OCS: objective career success SCS: subjective career success

• What is the main idea here? Is there only one?
• What language (words or phrases) cannot be paraphrased without compromising meaning?
• What material should not be included in the summary? Why?
• Draft two versions of a complete summary of this material including a citation in an appropriate format. Strive to make them grammatically distinct from each other and from the original.

The opinions or interpretation of the summary writer do not belong in a summary. When the assignment is an evaluative review, the author may inject information beyond the main idea of the summarized material.

Writers quote and paraphrase from research in order to support their points and to persuade their readers. A quote or a paraphrase from a piece of evidence in support of a point answers the reader’s question, “Says who?” This is especially true in academic writing since scholarly readers are most persuaded by effective research and documented evidence. For example, readers of an article about a new cancer medication published in a medical journal will be most interested in the research and statistics that demonstrate the effectiveness of the treatment. Conversely, they will not be as persuaded by emotional stories from individual patients about how a new cancer medication improved the quality of their lives. The real art to research writing is using evidence effectively to support the point. Certain rules of style are applied as prescribed by academic departments and publication editors, including which citation system to use.

Language in Action

A. How common are direct quotations in scholarly publications found in academic journals? Are they more or less common in publications meant for general consumption, like newspapers or internet blogs?

B. What is the strongest incentive for including and citing material from other sources?

Plagiarism awareness

Plagiarism is the unauthorized or uncredited use of the writings or ideas of another. While it might not be as tangible as stealing a car or robbing a bank, plagiarism is still a form of theft. The use of artificial intelligence programs (like Chat GPT ) does not produce original writing a researcher can call their own. As these resources become increasingly available, it is important for writers to focus on producing their own sentences, paragraphs, theses and ideas that they can explain and defend.

In the academic world, plagiarism is a serious matter because ideas in the forms of research, creative work, and original thought are highly valued. As it is a form of academic dishonesty, most schools have strict rules about what happens when someone is caught plagiarizing.

Like theft, plagiarism can take several different forms. The most well-known, purposeful plagiarism is submitting work written by someone else or material copied word for word from a source.

Both purposeful and accidental plagiarism are wrong, violate established rules, and often result in harsh punishments. Ignoring or not knowing the rules of how to properly cite evidence might be explanations, but they are not acceptable excuses.

Here are examples that use quotations and paraphrases from this original text from Cyberculture as translated by Robert Bononno:

1 Those who denounce cyberculture today strangely resemble those who criticized rock music during the fifties and sixties. 2 Rock started out as an Anglo-American phenomenon and has become an industry. 3 Nonetheless, it was able to capture the hopes of young people around the world and provided enjoyment to those of us who listened to or played rock. 4 Sixties pop was the conscience of one or two generations that helped bring the war in Vietnam to a close. 5 Obviously, neither rock nor pop has solved global poverty or hunger. 6 But is this a reason to be “against” them? (ix).

Source: Lévy, P. (2001). Cyberculture. Minneapolis, Minn.: University of Minnesota Press.

Examples of plagiarized work

First, an obvious example of plagiarism from that article.

1 Those who denounce cyberculture today strangely resemble those who criticized rock music during the fifties and sixties.

The writer has literally taken one of Lévy’s sentences and represented it as her own.

Another example:

1 The people who criticize cyberculture are the same kind of people who criticized rock and roll music back in the fifties and sixties. But both cyberculture and rock music inspire and entertain young people.

While these aren’t Lévy’s exact words, they are certainly close enough to constitute a form of plagiarism.

Examples of acceptable paraphrasing

These are stronger paraphrases, although the use of a direct quotation is not ideal.

1 Pierre Lévy suggests that people who criticize cyberculture are the same kind of people who criticized rock and roll music back in the fifties and sixties. But both cyberculture and rock music inspire and entertain young people (ix).

1 In the introduction of his book Cyberculture, Pierre Lévy observes that “Those who denounce cyberculture today strangely resemble those who criticized rock music during the fifties and sixties” (ix).

Note that changing these passages from examples of plagiarism to acceptable examples of a quotation and a paraphrase is only achieved by properly citing the source.

Often, students are unclear as to whether they need to cite a piece of evidence because they believe it to be common knowledge or because they are not sure about the source of information. What is common knowledge in a field is typically seen without a citation in a range of publications (from journal articles to dissertations and textbooks). [2]

Review and Reinforce

A. How does the research of others influence readers?

B. How much material from outside sources is required to support a message or thesis statement?

Exercise #2

1 In Taiwan, the delayed graduation of graduate students has become an important educational issue of social concern (Ho et al., 2020). 2  Gardner (2009) found that the reasons for the low graduation rate of doctoral students include being unable to complete their degree theses, among others. 3 The completion of the degree thesis is an important milestone and the biggest obstacle for graduate students (Blum, 2010).  4 Muszynski (1990) found that graduate students who fail to graduate in time may be uninterested in the research topic, have low academic confidence, or have too many research papers to complete.  5 Spaulding and Rockinson-Szapkiw (2012) interviewed 76 doctoral graduates and found that motivation, persistence factors, and completion strategies were necessary to complete their dissertations. [3]

1. Consider the above opening paragraph from A Study of Graduate Students’ Achievement Motivation, Active Learning, and Active Confidence Based on Relevant Research .

2. Then look at a paragraph from one of its primary sources (sentence #4 above), Hearing their Voices: Factors Doctoral Candidates Attribute to their Persistence .

1 When participants were interviewed, they worked in different states and professional settings across the United States and earned their degrees from varying institutions across the span of five decades (Participant 3 – 1976; Participant 36 – 2011); however, each participant shared one common experience—doctoral persistence, evidenced by the completion of an educational doctorate. 2 Though the contexts differed and motivations for pursuing the degree varied, participants all cited various personal sacrifices along the way, often found their completion expectations to be unrealistic due to a myriad of intervening factors, and largely found the dissertation to be the most challenging aspect of the degree completion process. 3 However, because they were both personally and professionally motivated to begin the degree, had compelling reasons to persist, developed an array of resilience mechanisms, and generated strategies for dissertation completion, these participants evaded becoming an attrition statistic, unlike presumably half of their peers (Ivankova & Stick, 2007; Nettles & Millet, 2006), and currently hold a terminal degree in their discipline. [4]

3. Evaluate how and why the supporting material was incorporated.

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• masks © Edmonton Economic Development Corporation is licensed under a CC BY-NC-SA (Attribution NonCommercial ShareAlike) license
• Andresen, M., Lazarova, M., Apospori, E., Cotton, R., Bosak, J., Dickmann, M., Kaše, R., & Smale, A. (2022). Does international work experience pay off? The relationship between international work experience, employability and career success: A 30-country, multi-industry study. Human Resource Management Journal , 32(3), 698–721. https://doi.org/10.1111/1748-8583.12423 ↵
• Adapted from Krause, S. (2021, March 23). The Process of Research Writing Retrieved June 2, 2021, from https://human.libretexts.org/@go/page/6460 ↵
• Chang, J.-C., Wu, Y.-T., & Ye, J.-N. (2022). A Study of Graduate Students’ Achievement Motivation, Active Learning, and Active Confidence Based on Relevant Research . Frontiers in Psychology,  13, 915770–915770. https://doi.org/10.3389/fpsyg.2022.915770 ↵
• Spaulding, L. S., & Rockinson-Szapkiw, A. (2012). Hearing their Voices: Factors Doctoral Candidates Attribute to their Persistence.  International Journal of Doctoral Studies , 7, 199-219. https://doi.org/10.28945/1589 ↵

a condensed version of a longer text

a direct restatement of the exact words from the original source

a restatement of the information or point of the original source in entirely new wording

a reference presenting their own data and information

reference material used and cited by a primary source

to act of presenting another source of information or ideas as one's own work; literary theft

Sourcing, summarizing, and synthesizing:  Skills for effective research writing  Copyright © 2023 by Wendy L. McBride is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 4.0 International License , except where otherwise noted.

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Paraphrase and Summary

When should i paraphrase, and when should i summarize.

To paraphrase means to restate someone else’s ideas in your own language at roughly the same level of detail. To summarize means to reduce the most essential points of someone else’s work into a shorter form. Along with quotation, paraphrase and summary provide the main tools for integrating your sources into your papers. When choosing which to use, consider first your discipline and the type of writing in which you are engaged. For example, literature reviews in science reports rely almost exclusively on summary. Argumentative essays, by contrast, rely on all three tools.

Paraphrase and summary are indispensable in argumentative papers because they allow you to include other people’s ideas without cluttering up your paragraphs with quotations . These techniques help you take greater control of your essay. Consider using either tool when an idea from one of your sources is important to your essay but the wording is not. Space limitations may guide you in your choice. But above all, think about how much of the detail from your source is relevant to your argument. If your reader needs to know only the bare bones, then summarize.

Though paraphrase and summary are often preferable to quotation, do not rely too heavily on them, either. Your ideas are what matter most. Allow yourself the space to develop those ideas.

How do I paraphrase?

Whenever you paraphrase, remember these two points:

• You must provide a reference.
• The paraphrase must be in your own words. You must do more than merely substitute phrases here and there. You must also create your own sentence structures.

Finding new words for ideas that are already well expressed can be hard, but changing words should not be your chief aim anyway. Focus, rather, on filtering the ideas through your own understanding. The following strategy will make the job of paraphrasing a lot easier:

• When you are at the note-taking stage, and you come across a passage that may be useful for your essay, do not copy the passage verbatim unless you think you will want to quote it.
• If you think you will want to paraphrase the passage, make a note only of the author’s basic point (or points). You don’t even need to use full sentences.
• In your note, you should already be translating the language of the original into your own words. What matters is that you capture the original idea.
• Make sure to jot down the source as well as the page number so that you can make a proper reference later on.

When it comes time to write the paper, rely on your notes rather than on the author’s work. You will find it much easier to avoid borrowing from the original passage because you will not have seen it recently. Follow this simple sequence:

• Convert the ideas from your notes into full sentences.
• Provide a reference.
• Go back to the original to ensure that (a) your paraphrase is accurate and (b) you have truly said things in your own words.

Let’s look at examples of illegitimate and legitimate paraphrase, using a passage from Oliver Sacks’ essay “An Anthropologist on Mars”:

The cause of autism has also been a matter of dispute. Its incidence is about one in a thousand, and it occurs throughout the world, its features remarkably consistent even in extremely different cultures. It is often not recognized in the first year of life, but tends to become obvious in the second or third year. Though Asperger regarded it as a biological defect of affective contact—innate, inborn, analogous to a physical or intellectual defect—Kanner tended to view it as a psychogenic disorder, a reflection of bad parenting, and most especially of a chillingly remote, often professional, "refrigerator mother." At this time, autism was often regarded as "defensive" in nature, or confused with childhood schizophrenia. A whole generation of parents—mothers, particularly—were made to feel guilty for the autism of their children.

What follows is an example of illegitimate paraphrase :

The cause of the condition autism has been disputed. It occurs in approximately one in a thousand children, and it exists in all parts of the world, its characteristics strikingly similar in vastly differing cultures. The condition is often not noticeable in the child’s first year, yet it becomes more apparent as the child reaches the age of two or three. Although Asperger saw the condition as a biological defect of the emotions that was inborn and therefore similar to a physical defect, Kanner saw it as psychological in origin, as reflecting poor parenting and particularly a frigidly distant mother. During this period, autism was often seen as a defence mechanism, or it was misdiagnosed as childhood schizophrenia. An entire generation of mothers and fathers (but especially mothers) were made to feel responsible for their offspring’s autism (Sacks 247-48).

Most of these sentences do little more than substitute one phrase for another. An additional problem with this passage is that the only citation occurs at the very end of the paragraph. The reader might be misled into thinking that the earlier sentences were not also based on Sacks.

The following represents a legitimate paraphrase of the original passage:

In "An Anthropologist on Mars," Sacks lists some of the known facts about autism. We know, for example, that the condition occurs in roughly one out of every thousand children. We also know that the characteristics of autism do not vary from one culture to the next. And we know that the condition is difficult to diagnose until the child has entered the second or third year of life. As Sacks points out, often a child who goes on to develop autism will show no sign of the condition at the age of one (247). Sacks observes, however, that researchers have had a hard time agreeing on the causes of autism. He sketches the diametrically opposed positions of Asperger and Kanner. On the one hand, Asperger saw the condition as representing a constitutional defect in the child's ability to make meaningful emotional contact with the external world. On the other hand, Kanner regarded autism as a consequence of harmful childrearing practices. For many years confusion about this condition reigned. One unfortunate consequence of this confusion, Sacks suggests, was the burden of guilt imposed on so many parents for their child's condition (247-48).

This paraphrase illustrates a few basic principles that can help you to paraphrase more effectively:

• Refer explicitly to the author in your paraphrase. The passage above makes explicit right away that the ideas come from Sacks. Its indebtedness is signaled in a few strategic places. The single parenthetical note at the end of each paragraph is therefore all that is needed by way of citation. Referring to Sacks also strengthens the passage by clarifying the source of its ideas.
• Don’t just paraphrase. Analyze. In the paraphrase of Sacks, the decision to split the original passage into two paragraphs adds an analytical dimension: the new passage doesn’t just reiterate his points but lays out the two-part structure of his argument.
• Not all of the details from the original passage need to be included in the paraphrase.
• You don't need to change every word. For the sake of clarity, keep essential terms the same (e.g., autism , culture , children ). However, avoid borrowing entire phrases (e.g., reflection of bad parenting ) unless they are part of the discourse of your field (e.g., psychogenic disorder ).

How do I summarize?

Summary moves much further than paraphrase from point-by-point translation. When you summarize a passage, you need first to absorb the meaning and then to capture in your own words the most important elements from the original passage. A summary is necessarily shorter than a paraphrase.

Here is a summary of the passage from "An Anthropologist on Mars":

In "An Anthropologist on Mars," Sacks notes that although there is little disagreement on the chief characteristics of autism, researchers have differed considerably on its causes. As he points out, Asperger saw the condition as an innate defect in the child's ability to connect with the external world, whereas Kanner regarded it as a consequence of harmful childrearing practices (247-48).

Written by Jerry Plotnick, Director, University College Writing Centre

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Identifying quoting, paraphrasing and summarizing

One common question that most new scholars ask is “how do i know when to quote, paraphrase, or summarize”.

There is no easy answer, it just takes practice. You will work with a number of instructors who will have different ideas on what you should do.  To start, here are a few general guidelines.

Use the exact words of an author, copied directly from the source, word for word. You must use quotation marks and an in-text citation.

Use quotes when you want to

• add the power of the author’s words to support your argument or claims
• disagree with something specific an author said
• highlight a specific passage
• compare or contrast points of view

Paraphrasing

Paraphrasing is stating an idea, point or passage in your own words. You must significantly change the wording, phrasing, and sentence structure of the source (not just a few words here and there; don’t just use a thesaurus and change out terms!).

Every paraphrase must also have in-text citations at the end of the paraphrased section and the original source identified on reference or works cited page.

Paraphrase when you want to

• clarify a short passage from a text
•  avoid overusing quotations
• explain a point when exact wording isn’t critical
• articulate the main ideas of a passage or part
• report numerical data or statistics

Summarizing

Summaries are a broad overview of the original material as a whole (not just a part, like a paraphrase). You may summarize an entire article, and then also paraphrase a small portion of the author’s findings. Like quotes and paraphrases, a summary must be cited with in-text citations and on your reference or works cited page.

Summarize when you want to:

• give an overview of a topic
• describe information (from several sources) about a topic

Learning these skills takes practice. It is okay if you are feeling overwhelmed.

Time to practice identifying the scholarly conversation →

Academic Integrity at the University of Minnesota Copyright © by University of Minnesota Libraries is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0 International License , except where otherwise noted.

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Practice Paraphrase/Summarize

You can practice your paraphrase and/or summary skills with the exercises below. Draft a summary and/or paraphrase on one or more of the practice exercises. UHV students can schedule an appointment with an Student Success Center tutor who can discuss paraphrase or summary with you. You can also send in your paraphrase or summary to the online tutors if you include the passage(s) you’re working on. Whether scheduling a face-to-face or submitting for an online session, please note that the tutor will only be able to tutor two or three exercises with you at one time.

Practice Exercise I:

In what was perhaps the first instance, the leap of imagination that gave rise to writing took place around 350 B.C. in Mesopotamia between the Tigris and Euphrates rivers in modern-day Iraq. Sometimes referred to as “the cradle of Western civilization,” Mesopotamia (meaning ‘between the rivers’) was inhabited at the time by the Sumerians and the Akkadians. These peoples were city dwellers with a sophisticated economic system based on agriculture, cattle, and commerce. Exactly how the Sumerians and Akkadians invented writing will never be known, but we can surmise that the potential for secondary symbolization was discovered fortuitously as someone struggled to formulate a visible message for which no agreed-upon visual symbols existed. (p. 482)

--Finegan, E. (1994). Language its structure and use (2nd ed.). Fortworth: Harcourt Brace College Publishers.

Practice Exercise II:

The persistently poor are only a minority of the people who ever experience poverty, but they place a disproportionate burden on welfare resources. Less than half of the people on welfare rolls at any one time are persistently poor, that is, likely to remain on welfare for five or more years. Thus, for most welfare recipients, welfare payments are a relatively short-term aid that helps them over life’s difficult times. For others, welfare is a more permanent part of their lives. (p. 121)

--Dye, T. (1995). Understanding public policy (8th ed.). Englewood Cliffs, New Jersey: Prentice Hall.

Practice Exercise III:

It is generally acknowledged that all organic beings have been formed on two great laws—Unity of Type, and the Conditions of Existence. By unity of type is meant that fundamental agreement in structure, which we see in organic beings of the same class, and which is quite independent of their habits of life. On my theory, unity of type is explained by unity of descent. The expression of conditions of existence, so often insisted on by the illustrious Cuvier, is fully embraced by the principle of natural selection. For natural selection acts by either now adapting the varying parts of each being to its organic and inorganic conditions of life; or by having adapted them during long-past periods of time: the adaptations being aided in some cases by use and disuse, being slightly affected by the direct action of the external conditions of life, and being in all cases subject to the several laws of growth. Hence, in fact, the law of the Conditions of Existence is the higher law; as it includes, through the inheritance of former adaptations, that of Unity of Type. (p. 233)

--Darwin, C. (1979). The origin of species . New York: Gramercy Books.

Practice Exercise IV:

Words and pictures that complement one another employ different visual and verbal content, and both modes are designed to work together in order to help the reader understand the same main idea (the same referent). Together, the two modes render the idea more fully than either does alone because each provides different information about the idea. For example, a complementary text and diagram combination about how a motor works might offer a 3-D presentation of the spatial features of the motor, a representation that would be cumbersome to provide in prose. On the other hand, details about the purpose of the motor and its practical uses might be best presented in words. Each form makes a unique contribution to strengthen and clarify the reader’s understanding of the main idea. (p. 415)

--Schriver, K. (1997). Dynamics in document design . New York: Wiley Computer Publishing.

Practice Exercise V:

Testing can also be stressful for developers. It is difficult to spend months on an interface and then watch people conspicuously fail to use it "correctly" during testing. Conducting usability testing requires developing an outlook that sees testing as part of the design process, rather than as a critical activity with potentially dire consequences. After all, it is widely accepted that all software has bugs that need to be addressed. It is unreasonable to expect user interfaces to emerge magically bug-free from the development process. When seen in this light, testing is extremely effective at helping developers to think about users and their needs.

--Gaffney, G. (2001). Do-it-yourself usability testing . Retrieved from http://www.infodesign.com.au/articles/diytesting.html.

Practice Exercise VI:

There is no necessary correlation between publicity, realness, and shareability. Persons can be most alone in their experience of the most public of spectacles; and most together in the sharing of the most ‘real’, yet unqualifiedly private of events. Sharing a common experience may be a token of the most genuine bond between two persons, or a token of the most abject bondage. Phantasy may or may not be experienced, by either the one person or the other, as inner or outer, private or public, shareable or unshareable, real or unreal. (p. 37)

-- Laing, R.D. (1969). Self and others . Harmondsworth, England: Penguin Books Ltd.

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Article • 12 min read

How to Paraphrase and Summarize Work

Summing up key ideas in your own words.

By the Mind Tools Content Team

Imagine you're preparing a presentation for your CEO. You asked everyone in your team to contribute, and they all had plenty to say!

But now you have a dozen reports, all in different styles, and your CEO says that she can spare only 10 minutes to read the final version. What do you do?

The solution is to paraphrase and summarize the reports, so your boss gets only the key information that she needs, in a form that she can process quickly.

In this article, we explain how to paraphrase and how to summarize, and how to apply these techniques to text and the spoken word. We also explore the differences between the two skills, and point out the pitfalls to avoid.

What Is Paraphrasing?

When you paraphrase, you use your own words to express something that was written or said by another person.

Putting it into your own words can clarify the message, make it more relevant to your audience , or give it greater impact.

You might use paraphrased material to support your own argument or viewpoint. Or, if you're putting together a report , presentation or speech , you can use paraphrasing to maintain a consistent style, and to avoid lengthy quotations from the original text or conversation.

Paraphrased material should keep its original meaning and (approximate) length, but you can use it to pick out a single point from a longer discussion.

What Is Summarizing?

In contrast, a summary is a brief overview of an entire discussion or argument. You might summarize a whole research paper or conversation in a single paragraph, for example, or with a series of bullet points, using your own words and style.

People often summarize when the original material is long, or to emphasize key facts or points. Summaries leave out detail or examples that may distract the reader from the most important information, and they simplify complex arguments, grammar and vocabulary.

Used correctly, summarizing and paraphrasing can save time, increase understanding, and give authority and credibility to your work. Both tools are useful when the precise wording of the original communication is less important than its overall meaning.

How to Paraphrase Text

To paraphrase text, follow these four steps:

1. Read and Make Notes

Carefully read the text that you want to paraphrase. Highlight, underline or note down important terms and phrases that you need to remember.

2. Find Different Terms

Find equivalent words or phrases (synonyms) to use in place of the ones that you've picked out. A dictionary, thesaurus or online search can be useful here, but take care to preserve the meaning of the original text, particularly if you're dealing with technical or scientific terms.

3. Put the Text into Your Own Words

Rewrite the original text, line by line. Simplify the grammar and vocabulary, adjust the order of the words and sentences, and replace "passive" expressions with "active" ones (for example, you could change "The new supplier was contacted by Nusrat" to "Nusrat contacted the new supplier").

Remove complex clauses, and break longer sentences into shorter ones. All of this will make your new version easier to understand .

4. Check Your Work

Check your work by comparing it to the original. Your paraphrase should be clear and simple, and written in your own words. It may be shorter, but it should include all of the necessary detail.

Paraphrasing: an Example

Despite the undoubted fact that everyone's vision of what constitutes success is different, one should spend one's time establishing and finalizing one's personal vision of it. Otherwise, how can you possibly understand what your final destination might be, or whether or not your decisions are assisting you in moving in the direction of the goals which you've set yourself?

The two kinds of statement – mission and vision – can be invaluable to your approach, aiding you, as they do, in focusing on your primary goal, and quickly identifying possibilities that you might wish to exploit and explore.

We all have different ideas about success. What's important is that you spend time defining your version of success. That way, you'll understand what you should be working toward. You'll also know if your decisions are helping you to move toward your goals.

Used as part of your personal approach to goal-setting, mission and vision statements are useful for bringing sharp focus to your most important goal, and for helping you to quickly identify which opportunities you should pursue.

How to Paraphrase Speech

In a conversation – a meeting or coaching session, for example – paraphrasing is a good way to make sure that you have correctly understood what the other person has said.

This requires two additional skills: active listening and asking the right questions .

Useful questions include:

• If I hear you correctly, you're saying that…?
• So you mean that…? Is that right?
• Did I understand you when you said that…?

You can use questions like these to repeat the speaker's words back to them. For instance, if the person says, "We just don't have the funds available for these projects," you could reply: "If I understand you correctly, you're saying that our organization can't afford to pay for my team's projects?"

This may seem repetitive, but it gives the speaker the opportunity to highlight any misunderstandings, or to clarify their position.

When you're paraphrasing conversations in this way, take care not to introduce new ideas or information, and not to make judgments on what the other person has said, or to "spin" their words toward what you want to hear. Instead, simply restate their position as you understand it.

Sometimes, you may need to paraphrase a speech or a presentation. Perhaps you want to report back to your team, or write about it in a company blog, for example.

In these cases it's a good idea to make summary notes as you listen, and to work them up into a paraphrase later. (See How to Summarize Text or Speech, below.)

How to Summarize Text or Speech

Follow steps 1-5 below to summarize text. To summarize spoken material – a speech, a meeting, or a presentation, for example – start at step three.

1. Get a General Idea of the Original

First, speed read the text that you're summarizing to get a general impression of its content. Pay particular attention to the title, introduction, conclusion, and the headings and subheadings.

2. Check Your Understanding

Build your comprehension of the text by reading it again more carefully. Check that your initial interpretation of the content was correct.

3. Make Notes

Take notes on what you're reading or listening to. Use bullet points, and introduce each bullet with a key word or idea. Write down only one point or idea for each bullet.

If you're summarizing spoken material, you may not have much time on each point before the speaker moves on. If you can, obtain a meeting agenda, a copy of the presentation, or a transcript of the speech in advance, so you know what's coming.

Make sure your notes are concise, well-ordered, and include only the points that really matter.

The Cornell Note-Taking System is an effective way to organize your notes as you write them, so that you can easily identify key points and actions later. Our article, Writing Meeting Notes , also contains plenty of useful advice.

4. Write Your Summary

Bullet points or numbered lists are often an acceptable format for summaries – for example, on presentation slides, in the minutes of a meeting, or in Key Points sections like the one at the end of this article.

However, don't just use the bulleted notes that you took in step 3. They'll likely need editing or "polishing" if you want other people to understand them.

Some summaries, such as research paper abstracts, press releases, and marketing copy, require continuous prose. If this is the case, write your summary as a paragraph, turning each bullet point into a full sentence.

Aim to use only your own notes, and refer to original documents or recordings only if you really need to. This helps to ensure that you use your own words.

If you're summarizing speech, do so as soon as possible after the event, while it's still fresh in your mind.

5. Check Your Work

Your summary should be a brief but informative outline of the original. Check that you've expressed all of the most important points in your own words, and that you've left out any unnecessary detail.

Summarizing: an Example

So how do you go about identifying your strengths and weaknesses, and analyzing the opportunities and threats that flow from them? SWOT Analysis is a useful technique that helps you to do this.

What makes SWOT especially powerful is that, with a little thought, it can help you to uncover opportunities that you would not otherwise have spotted. And by understanding your weaknesses, you can manage and eliminate threats that might otherwise hurt your ability to move forward in your role.

If you look at yourself using the SWOT framework, you can start to separate yourself from your peers, and further develop the specialized talents and abilities that you need in order to advance your career and to help you achieve your personal goals.

SWOT Analysis is a technique that helps you identify strengths, weakness, opportunities, and threats. Understanding and managing these factors helps you to develop the abilities you need to achieve your goals and progress in your career.

Permission and Citations

If you intend to publish or circulate your document, it's important to seek permission from the copyright holder of the material that you've paraphrased or summarized. Failure to do so can leave you open to allegations of plagiarism, or even legal action.

It's good practice to cite your sources with a footnote, or with a reference in the text to a list of sources at the end of your document. There are several standard citation styles – choose one and apply it consistently, or follow your organization's house style guidelines.

As well as acknowledging the original author, citations tell you, the reader, that you're reading paraphrased or summarized material. This enables you to check the original source if you think that someone else's words may have been misused or misinterpreted.

Some writers might use others' ideas to prop up their own, but include only what suits them, for instance. Others may have misunderstood the original arguments, or "twisted" them by adding their own material.

If you're wary, or you find problems with the work, you may prefer to seek more reliable sources of information. (See our article, How to Spot Real and Fake News , for more on this.)

Paraphrasing means rephrasing text or speech in your own words, without changing its meaning. Summarizing means cutting it down to its bare essentials. You can use both techniques to clarify and simplify complex information or ideas.

To paraphrase text:

• Read and make notes.
• Find different terms.
• Put the text into your own words.
• Check your work.

You can also use paraphrasing in a meeting or conversation, by listening carefully to what's being said and repeating it back to the speaker to check that you have understood it correctly.

To summarize text or speech:

• Get a general idea of the original.
• Check your understanding.
• Make notes.
• Write your summary.

Seek permission for any copyrighted material that you use, and cite it appropriately.

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Sample Essay for Summarizing, Paraphrasing, and Quoting

Welcome to the Purdue OWL

This page is brought to you by the OWL at Purdue University. When printing this page, you must include the entire legal notice.

Copyright ©1995-2018 by The Writing Lab & The OWL at Purdue and Purdue University. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, reproduced, broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed without permission. Use of this site constitutes acceptance of our terms and conditions of fair use.

The following is a sample essay you can practice quoting, paraphrasing, and summarizing. Examples of each task are provided at the end of the essay for further reference. Here is the citation for Sipher's essay:

Sipher, Roger. “So That Nobody Has to Go to School If They Don't Want To.” The New York Times , 19 Dec. 1977, p. 31.

So That Nobody Has To Go To School If They Don't Want To

by Roger Sipher

A decline in standardized test scores is but the most recent indicator that American education is in trouble.

One reason for the crisis is that present mandatory-attendance laws force many to attend school who have no wish to be there. Such children have little desire to learn and are so antagonistic to school that neither they nor more highly motivated students receive the quality education that is the birthright of every American.

The solution to this problem is simple: Abolish compulsory-attendance laws and allow only those who are committed to getting an education to attend.

This will not end public education. Contrary to conventional belief, legislators enacted compulsory-attendance laws to legalize what already existed. William Landes and Lewis Solomon, economists, found little evidence that mandatory-attendance laws increased the number of children in school. They found, too, that school systems have never effectively enforced such laws, usually because of the expense involved.

There is no contradiction between the assertion that compulsory attendance has had little effect on the number of children attending school and the argument that repeal would be a positive step toward improving education. Most parents want a high school education for their children. Unfortunately, compulsory attendance hampers the ability of public school officials to enforce legitimate educational and disciplinary policies and thereby make the education a good one.

Private schools have no such problem. They can fail or dismiss students, knowing such students can attend public school. Without compulsory attendance, public schools would be freer to oust students whose academic or personal behavior undermines the educational mission of the institution.

Has not the noble experiment of a formal education for everyone failed? While we pay homage to the homily, "You can lead a horse to water but you can't make him drink," we have pretended it is not true in education.

Ask high school teachers if recalcitrant students learn anything of value. Ask teachers if these students do any homework. Quite the contrary, these students know they will be passed from grade to grade until they are old enough to quit or until, as is more likely, they receive a high school diploma. At the point when students could legally quit, most choose to remain since they know they are likely to be allowed to graduate whether they do acceptable work or not.

Abolition of archaic attendance laws would produce enormous dividends.

First, it would alert everyone that school is a serious place where one goes to learn. Schools are neither day-care centers nor indoor street corners. Young people who resist learning should stay away; indeed, an end to compulsory schooling would require them to stay away.

Second, students opposed to learning would not be able to pollute the educational atmosphere for those who want to learn. Teachers could stop policing recalcitrant students and start educating.

Third, grades would show what they are supposed to: how well a student is learning. Parents could again read report cards and know if their children were making progress.

Fourth, public esteem for schools would increase. People would stop regarding them as way stations for adolescents and start thinking of them as institutions for educating America's youth.

Fifth, elementary schools would change because students would find out early they had better learn something or risk flunking out later. Elementary teachers would no longer have to pass their failures on to junior high and high school.

Sixth, the cost of enforcing compulsory education would be eliminated. Despite enforcement efforts, nearly 15 percent of the school-age children in our largest cities are almost permanently absent from school.

Communities could use these savings to support institutions to deal with young people not in school. If, in the long run, these institutions prove more costly, at least we would not confuse their mission with that of schools.

Schools should be for education. At present, they are only tangentially so. They have attempted to serve an all-encompassing social function, trying to be all things to all people. In the process they have failed miserably at what they were originally formed to accomplish.

Example Summary, Paraphrase, and Quotation from the Essay:

Example summary: Roger Sipher makes his case for getting rid of compulsory-attendance laws in primary and secondary schools with six arguments. These fall into three groups—first that education is for those who want to learn and by including those that don't want to learn, everyone suffers. Second, that grades would be reflective of effort and elementary school teachers wouldn't feel compelled to pass failing students. Third, that schools would both save money and save face with the elimination of compulsory-attendance laws.

Example paraphrase of the essay's conclusion: Roger Sipher concludes his essay by insisting that schools have failed to fulfill their primary duty of education because they try to fill multiple social functions (par. 17).

Example quotation: According to Roger Sipher, a solution to the perceived crisis of American education is to "[a]bolish compulsory-attendance laws and allow only those who are committed to getting an education to attend" (par. 3).