Summarizing worksheets

Each click picks one of the 23 passages written for this grade. Every sheet comes with its answer key. You don't need to sign up.

A summary tells the whole story in a sentence or two: who or what, the big problem or idea, and how it turned out. Small details stay behind.

Four grades, each its own sheet. Print one here, or open a grade for examples and teaching notes.

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3rd grade

Examples and teaching notes

Summarizing worksheets for third grade pair a full-page passage with questions that build the skill in steps: pick the sentence that sums up the whole passage, spot a detail that belongs in a summary, and catch one that is too small to keep. Wrong choices are true statements that are too narrow or too broad.
4th grade Core grade

Examples and teaching notes

Each click picks one of the 23 passages written for this grade. Every sheet comes with its answer key. You don't need to sign up.

These 4th grade summary worksheets give your child a longer passage with more going on, so the best summary has to cover the problem, the turn, and the ending. Questions also ask why a weak summary fails. That is where most of the learning happens.
5th grade

Examples and teaching notes

Fifth grade passages carry several threads at once, and the best summary has to hold them together fairly. Your child distinguishes summaries from topics, keeps opinions out, and picks the details a fair summary cannot live without.
6th grade

Examples and teaching notes

Sixth grade summarizing passages mix real history and science with stories that carry several threads, and the questions add the standard's new test: keeping your own opinions out. Your child picks the summary that covers the whole arc, spots the detail a summary cannot drop, catches one too small to keep, and names the option that is a judgment instead of a fact from the text.

Or all English worksheets: every grade, every topic.