An article summary is a great way to understand the key points without going through the original text. A summary gives the reader a concise yet clear objective. It restates the main points of the articles concisely without giving the dates, statistics, or numbers. It also doesn’t include any examples. A summary not only saves time for the readers but also makes it easy to understand the text’s objective.

Summarization is a skill that is essential for every writer. Whether you’re a student, a researcher, or a professional, you can benefit from writing effective summaries. While it may sound pretty simple, it isn’t easy when you sit down to write. It is hard to understand what to include and what not to include in your summary.

In this article, we guide you on how to write summaries quickly and more effectively:

1. Read the Article Thoroughly

To write an effective summary, understanding the original text is crucial. As a first step, read the article 2-3 times. In most cases, the first reading does not provide the necessary understanding of the article. The second reading can deepen your understanding of the article and help you find answers to your questions. In the third reading, you can highlight the important points in summary.

Reading a short text 2-3 times is easier, but it isn’t easy to read a book even once. Reading a book can take weeks or even months, and it is not feasible to write summaries of the books, at least not through traditional methods. With the advancements in technology, many automatic summarization tools have emerged. An automatic document summarizer can help summarize larger texts such as books, thesis, or large articles. It can not only save time but all the effort to write the summary as well.

2. Divide the Article into Sections

As a second step, divide the article into subsections. The article is easier to understand when it is divided into smaller sections such as the introduction, main body, and conclusion. If the text you are summarizing is a thesis or a research article, it may already be divided into sections. However, when summarizing other types of articles, you might need to structure the article to get a clear picture of it.

3. Highlight or Mark Key Points

Suppose you have thoroughly understood the article by reading it multiple times. Now is the right time to highlight the main points of the article. It is very important to highlight because there are chances that you miss out on some key points when you start writing. Highlighting the main points can save time and effort as you don’t have to remember what you had read, eliminating the chances of missing out on important points.

A pro tip is to write summarized versions of all the key points in the margins when you are highlighting the main points. It can help you write the summary in very little time.

4. Create a Draft and Write the Summary

Now that you have built the understanding and have highlighted all the key points, it is time to create a rough draft of the summary. If you had written summarized versions of the key points while highlighting the important points, you’d only have to take them and arrange them in sequence. However, if you don’t do this step, you’ll have to look at all the key points and then write a concise version of each point. It is important to write in a sequence so that the lines connect and make sense.

One important point to note here is to write in your own words, don’t just copy and paste from the original text. The only time you can copy and paste from the article is when you are using direct quotations. However, it is not encouraged to use quotations in summary. Another important point in writing a summary is to keep an objective tone. Many confuse a summary with a critical review and start criticizing the article. However, a summary and a critical review are different.

5. Compare the Summary with the Original Text

The final part of an effective summary is comparing it with the original article. Check if the summary accurately represents the authors’ original work and if the sentences are in sequence. Read carefully to ensure nothing important has been missed and the wordings are not too similar to the original text.

Conclusion

Whether you are a student doing an assignment or a researcher analyzing the work of others, summarizing is an essential skill. It can help you understand large texts easily and also helps in saving time. Although it might seem easy but writing an effective summary is difficult. Fortunately, you can follow the above-given steps to improve your summary writing experience.

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