What are the steps to write a good summary writing and to write a good paraphrase writing?

Answer 1

The first step, always, is to read the thing you're summarizing or paraphrasing. You can't compress the information (summary) or make it more accessible (paraphrase) without having read it--and, ideally, more than once. As time permits, read the first time just to read through and get an idea of what's going on. Read again to make or take notes, pointing out what's important and what confuses. Another re-read or two will reveal more of those, as well.

For a summary, it'll be enough after the readings to begin drafting. The first sentence in a stand-alone summary should identify the thing you're summarizing. The next sentence should point out its central point. Following sentences should note the important points in the thing you're summarizing--in the order they appear. Chapter titles and section headings will be give-aways for this, but for pieces that don't have them, go back to your notes about what's important.

For a paraphrase, you'll want to look into the things that confuse you, doing research until you understand them. (You can't make it more accessible if you don't understand it.) Once you're not confused, draft the paraphrase. If it's a stand-alone thing, you'll open the same way as you do a summary; the first two sentences will be the same. After that, though, you'll want to break down the major ideas in the way that makes them easiest to understand--which may not be the order they appear in the thing you're paraphrasing, and which may be longer than the original.

Answer 2

Hi! I'm Dr. Nicole - What a great question!! I will assume you are talking about academic writing. There are several key steps to writing a good summary or in paraphrasing academic content.

1. First, you need to thoroughly understand the text that you are trying to summarize or paraphrase. For example, if you are trying to paraphrase text from a research article, read the article a few (or even several) times until you feel really comfortable with the information at hand.
2. Second, you need to be able to summarize the content that you are trying to write about verbally/ out loud. This may sound like a silly exercise, but it REALLY works. So, grab a friend or a family member and make them listen to you paraphrase the content out loud. If you can summarize it for them clearly, and they understand what have you said, then you are very close to being able to paraphrase it in writing. Note: this is a key step because oftentimes something gets lost between our thoughts in our heads and the information we type out on our keyboards. So, the exercise of summarizing out loud helps to shed light on the true extent to which our thoughts are well formed and concrete enough to be able to type them out.
3. Third, type out your summary and read it. You may find that you have to edit it once or even several times in order to get it right.
4. Fourth, have someone else read your writing. An objective reader will be able to point out where your writing is unclear or confusing.

These steps are really useful for learning how to summarize or paraphrase academic text. However, another very important thing to know is that good writing requires LOTS of practice. So you may have to go over these steps several times until you become really comfortable with summarizing content in your own words.

If you require additional coaching in your academic writing, feel free to reach out to me for help. My public profile is: https://www.wyzant.com/tutor/profile

Best of luck to you!

Nicole H., PhD

Academic consultant in research and writing