Main Idea & Details with Lauren Lynes

Hi there! It's Lauren Lynes from Simply Second Grade! I am so excited to be a part of this awesome collaboration of 2nd grade teachers! This is my 8th year teaching 2nd grade, and I have taught at the same school for my whole career! For the past three years, I have been team teaching with my sweet friend, Amy! It has been an amazing experience! If you follow my blog, you probably know that my husband, Todd, and I welcomed our sweet baby girl, Mia Nicole, into the world in August! She is a busy, curious, and sweet 7 (almost 8) month old! She is almost crawling, so she is keeping us super busy! She is obsessed with our sweet furbabies, Lulu and Molly :) Here are a few photos of me and my girls!

For Show-N-Tell, I wanted to share with you all how I have been introducing main idea and details to my kiddos for the past few years! This can be a tricky concept for little learners. So, before we even begin to think about finding main idea and details in a text, we do a hands on activity. I recommend splitting it into two days, but you could certainly do it in one day if needed! 

On Day 1, I bring a bag to school with 4 items in it. I tell the students that I had a big idea in my mind when I was putting the bag together. This year I brought a bag with baby items, {baby shampoo, a bottle, baby food, and baby wipes}. I pull each item, or each detail, out one at a time, and the kids have to draw and label it on their record sheet. As a class, the kids have to decide what the big idea, or main idea, of my bag is. This year they all agreed that everything in the bag had to do with taking care of a baby! Cue the brain kisses! 

On Day 2, I prepare bags for each table. As a group, they have to determine what the main idea of their bag is. I give very specific procedures for this activity. I pick one student to be the leader. He/she is in charge of passing the items around. The leader takes one item out of the bag, and it has to be passed to everyone at the table. Once everyone has had 5 seconds to hold the item and it makes it back to the leader, they will draw and label the item on their own record sheets. They do not move on until everyone is ready :) They repeat this procedure with the remaining items, and once the whole group has drawn and labeled all of the items, they discuss what they think the main idea of the bag is! Here are some examples of the bags I put together, along with the student record sheets:

As an extension, I usually have my students write another item they could put in the bag and why it could go in the bag! You could also have them write what would not be able to go in the bag, and why. The students always enjoy this activity, and it really does help them grasp main idea and details! Then we are ready to begin finding the main idea and details in text!

You can read more about Main Idea & Details in some of my blog posts over at Simply Second Grade!