Katie Williams

INTR 613
Topic Sentences and Predicting the Main Idea
Context Description: IEP High Intermediate reading course
Objectives
1) Students will be able to identify the topic sentence of a paragraph
2) Students will be able to identify clues in the topic sentence
3) Students will be able to predict the main idea using the clues in the topic sentence

What the students have been taught prior to this activity:

Warm-up Review of prior learning paragraph structure
Introduction Teacher shows students paragraphs that have no topic sentence. Class discussion about whats
missing and why topic sentences are important (showing the purpose of this lesson)
Presentation of Students have learned that topic sentences are the first sentences of a paragraph and introduce
New Material the ideas found in the content of the paragraph.
PART 1
Guided Practice Students have done a worksheet, in pairs, where they match several topic sentences to their
respective paragraphs.

Todays Microteaching Lesson

Presentation of 1. After students have done their topic sentence matching worksheet, the teacher takes the
New Material concept of the topic sentence further with the second part of the lecture (PowerPoint).
PART 2 Teacher explains that the topic sentence gives us clues about the content of the
paragraph
Teacher explains that we can use these clues to identify the main idea of a paragraph
Teacher shows the several different types of topic sentences and their clues, asking for
students to predict some of the main points of the paragraph based on the clues
Teacher will prompt students to decide on one main idea based on the main points
Communicative 2. Teacher gives the following instructions:
Practice For this activity, Im going to split you into two teams. Team 1 will read only the topic sentence of a
paragraph and will have to predict the main points and the main idea. Team 2 will read the paragraph
without the topic sentence, and they will have list the main points and the main idea and then predict the
topic sentence. Then the teams will report to one another to compare answers.
3. Students carry out the activity. Teacher walks around and monitors.
Closure 4. Upon reuniting the two teams, teacher facilitates as they share and compare their answers,
prompting them to justify and explain how they got their answers.
5. (If Team 2 correctly identify last sentence as main point) Teacher points out that the main idea
can be found at the end of the paragraph, as they found in this activity. Teacher explains that
they will talk more about the main idea in the next class.
Name: _________________ Team 1

Read
The Bible, while mainly a theological document, is secondarily a book of history and geography. Selected
historical materials were included in the text for the purpose of illustrating and underlining the religious
teaching of the Bible. Historians and archeologists have learned to rely upon the amazing accuracy of
historical memory in the Bible. The smallest references to persons and places and events contained in the
accounts of the Exodus, for instance, or the biographies of such Biblical heroes as Abraham and Moses and
David, can lead, if properly considered and pursued, to extremely important historical discoveries. The
archeologists efforts are not directed at proving the correctness of the Bible, which is neither necessary
nor possible, any more than belief in God can be scientifically demonstrated. It is quite the opposite, in fact.
The historical clues in the Bible can lead the archeologist to a knowledge of the civilizations of the ancient
world in which the Bible developed and with whose religious concepts and practices the Bible so radically
differed. It can be considered as an almost unfailing indicator, revealing to experts the locations and
characteristics of lost cities and civilizations.
Discuss
In your group, 1) look at the clues in the topic sentence, and 2) use the clues to predict the main points of the
paragraph.
1) Clues from Topic Sentence 2) Predictions of Main Points

Main Idea
Based on your prediction of the main points, predict the main idea of the paragraph.
Name: _________________ Team 2

Read
The Bible, while mainly a theological document, is secondarily a book of history and geography. Selected
historical materials were included in the text for the purpose of illustrating and underlining the religious
teaching of the Bible. Historians and archeologists have learned to rely upon the amazing accuracy of historical
memory in the Bible. The smallest references to persons and places and events contained in the accounts of
the Exodus, for instance, or the biographies of such Biblical heroes as Abraham and Moses and David, can
lead, if properly considered and pursued, to extremely important historical discoveries. The archeologists
efforts are not directed at proving the correctness of the Bible, which is neither necessary nor possible, any
more than belief in God can be scientifically demonstrated. It is quite the opposite, in fact. The historical clues
in the Bible can lead the archeologist to a knowledge of the civilizations of the ancient world in which the Bible
developed and with whose religious concepts and practices the Bible so radically differed. It can be considered
as an almost unfailing indicator, revealing to experts the locations and characteristics of lost cities and
civilizations.
Discuss
In your group, 1) list the main points covered in this paragraph, 2) write one statement that best expresses the
main idea, and 3) predict the topic sentence based on your answers for 1) and 2).
1) Main Points

2) Main Idea

3) Topic Sentence Prediction