Tell your students that they are going to play games to help them find the main idea of paragraphs. To find the main idea, they will have to find a paragraph's general topic (for example, tigers) and the author's idea about the topic (for examples, tigers are becoming extinct). The author's idea about the topic holds the paragraph together, and every other sentence in the paragraph should relate to and build on that main idea in some way. In some games the student use the paragraph's main idea to find details; in other games they will use details to find the main idea.
Explain to your students that the headline of an article can give the main idea. Review grade-appropriate newspaper articles with headlines, having the students use pencils to underline sentence details that relate to the headlines. Then give the students one or more articles to read that have missing headlines. They will decide on an appropriate headline for each article by using details from the articles to find the main idea. They will then fill in the missing headlines by writing the author's main idea in their own words, in the form of a complete sentence.
Divide your students into groups of four detectives. Write four main idea sentences on the board and tell the students that each detective in their group will be given a reading assignment, then each group must choose the correct main idea sentence.
Detective 1 must read and look for a main idea to fit the first sentence, then underline and write the details. Detective 2 must read and look for the main idea to fit the last sentence and underline and write the details. Detective 3 must read and look for the main idea to fit the middle of the paragraph and underline and write the details. Detective 4 must read and look for the main idea to fit two different sentences in the paragraph and underline and write the details.
When the detectives in each group have completed their reading assignment, they discuss their findings and choose the sentence on the board that matches the group's details. They then have the teacher review their findings and confirm their results. If a group's results are not correct, the detectives begin again by looking for new details to help them find the correct main idea sentence.
Have students read a grade-level selection from a handout with a short story or article. They should underline the details for the reading selection and write down each detail in the detail organizer section of the handout. They then reread the details and write a sentence that summarizes the main idea using 20 words or fewer.