Page 531 - Wordsmith A Guide to College Writing

A summary is a statement of the main idea of a longer portion of a
work. Like a paraphrase, your summary should restate the author’s

idea in your own words. Unlike a paraphrase, your summary does not

need to capture the details of the paragraph or section of the work that

you are summarizing. Therefore, a paragraph summary might be just

a sentence or two, and a summary of a chapter might be just a

paragraph or two.

Exercise 11-3 Summarizing Short

Passages

Summarize the following passages in a sentence or two.

1. Migraine researchers have recently confirmed what many
migraineurs, or migraine sufferers, have known all along:

Weather can affect migraines. Specifically, falling barometric

pressure can trigger a migraine in many people. People who

possess what one sufferer terms a “weather head” often feel

symptoms as a thunderstorm rolls in and the barometric

pressure begins to fall. “I should have been a weather
forecaster,” jokes one longtime migraine sufferer. “I always

know when a storm is coming.”

2. What is the scientific method? The scientific method is a
process of gathering and testing information. The four steps in

the scientific method are observation, formulation of a