How to retell the text (article, extract, story)
What is retelling for?
Retelling
- is a great way to share information about a text with other people
- is a good way to remember what you’ve read
- helps to make sure that you really understand a text.
Retelling is an important foundational skill for language learners. It promotes story comprehension and helps students develop expressive vocabulary. When students can retell a story, they are activating their thinking skills, and their imagination. They are also developing sequencing skills as they work to explain and retell the events of a story in the order they read them. Students who can read a text and retell the story have an understanding of the story plot.
Here you can find useful phrases how to retell the text.
The beginning of the rendering the text
- I am going to tell you about the text that I’ve just read.
- I’ll try to say a few words about the text that I’ve read.
- I’ve read the passage from the book … by …
- I’d like to comment on the book that I’ve read.
The title of the text
- The text is headlined …
- The headline of the article I’ve read is …
- The headline reads as follows …
The author of the book; when and where it was published
- The author of the book is …
- The text is written by …
- It was published in …
The main idea of the text
This text deals with ….
The story is about …
The article is devoted to …
The text touches upon …
The story is a dramatic (interesting, funny, amusing, exciting) episode about …
The article gives much information on …
The purpose of the text is to give the reader some information on …
The aim of the text is to provide the reader with some material (data) on …
The contents of the text
The author starts by telling the readers about …
The text begins with the description …
The text describes …
The author writes (states, stresses, thinks, points out) …
According to the text …
The text goes on to say …
In conclusion …
The author comes to the conclusion that …
Your opinion of the text
I found the text interesting (amusing, funny, important, dull, of no value, informative, too hard to understand).
In my opinion …
As far as I am concerned …
To my mind
As for me
I think
It seems to me
I believe
I consider
I guess
I think Retelling gives more impacts to our students soon after their first level vocabulary is sufficient enough. Do you have any other suggestions for this?
Thanks for leaving your comment. The aim of a teacher is to help students enrich their vocabulary and increase their thinking skills and encourage them to turn from retelling to summarizing which requires more language and demands thinking.