HFCC
Writing Improvement
Tutorials
Courtesy of Rick Bailey, A.D.
English Instructor
Summary provides the reader with a snapshot of what you have read. However, it is up to you how to take that snapshot. How you summarize depends on why you read. You can summarize to capture the important details of a story, to provide a general overview of important ideas, or to convey the opinion or point of view in what you read.
When you write, in some instances you draw upon your own experience and tell your stories. Often, however, your own personal narratives aren't sufficient to the writing task you face. What if you are writing about a subject with which you have no direct experience? In cases like this, you acquire stories in your reading. You tell others' stories. To summarize a story, you need to identify the important details of a story: what happened, where and when, who was involved, and the outcome. Summary enables you to tell stories you get from your reading.
Lives Changed in a Split Second
Charles Wheelan
Until the early morning hours of
January 3, my wife and I had many reasons to drive a sport
utility vehicle. As our only car, it offered space for our two
children, the dog, and the things we hauled around, like the
Christmas tree. We like being in a big vehicle with a high
vantage point in a city full of crazy drivers. Since we take
public transportation to work and don't drive much, we could
rationalize away the bad gas mileage and the high emissions. And
to be honest, a S.U.V. projected a different image than a
minivan or station wagon.
But our Ford Explorer felt a lot less practical as we lay
smashed upside down in it on Interstate 80 at 4:00 a.m. last
Wednesday. My wife was trapped in the passenger seat. Our two
daughters hung from their car seats, screaming. The dog was
silent. After skidding on a patch of ice, the truck flipped and
slid across the median to within a foot of traffic going 65
m.p.h. in the other direction.
I learned a lot of things very quickly. Each of our girls
screams in a slightly different way, and I now know that it is a
good thing to hear both screams coming from inside a crushed
vehicle-because it means that everyone is alive. I learned that
I can unhook a child from a car seat upside down in the dark
with hands so cold that they have lost nearly all sensation. I
know that when there is no other way to get a six-month-old out
of a crushed vehicle sitting dangerously close to traffic, you
will drag her through broken glass. I learned that strangers
will stop in the middle the night a practice remarkable acts of
kindness, including searching through the wreckage for a missing
finger.
In the grand scheme of things, we're in a great shape. My
three-year-old daughter's hand was smashed, and she has lost her
right thumb. I don't want to minimize the challenges she faces,
but I often visualize the range of possible outcomes, and this
one was very, very good.
Rollovers make up a small fraction of all accidents but are
responsible for a disproportionate number of deaths,
particularly in S.U.V.'s. And this week the National Highway
Traffic Safety Administration gave the Ford Explorer two stars
out of a possible five-meaning a 30 to 40 percent chance of
flipping in an accident, compared to a less than 10 percent
chance for a vehicle with a five-star rating.
Even without the new data, I should have known better. I
have followed the Ford Explorer story and have even written
about it. True, our truck did not have Firestone tires. Our
family was riding on the "good tires"; Ford even sent us a
letter to tell us that. But I should have recognized that the
tire issue masked the more fundamental problem: S.U.V.'s as a
class are more likely to roll over than other vehicles. Indeed,
the problem is inherent in vehicles that ride high on a
relatively narrow wheel base, which is the most attractive
feature of S.U.V's.
I do not believe that my family is alive because we were in
a big truck. We are alive because of seat belts and car seats.
(I will never fully understand how the dog made it, but he did.)
I believe that a car with a lower center of gravity would not
have been so likely to skid on an icy road, nor would it have
flipped so easily when we hit deep snow on the median. Can that
be proved in this case? Maybe.
Ford has redesigned the 2002 Explorer to make it less likely to
flip and has been eager to settle rollover suits with people
involved in far worse accidents than ours in earlier models,
including one settled this week involving a Texas woman who was
left a quadriplegic. I now know how quickly a rollover can
happen. I never should have put my family in that truck or any
other like it. (678 words)
Charles Wheelan and his wife drove a Ford Explorer because it was practical. Then came a terrible accident. On a Wednesday morning, around 4:00 a.m., the car skidded on ice and rolled over, trapping Wheelan, his wife, and children in the car. In the end, no one was killed or horribly injured, although his daughter lost a finger. The incident reminded Wheelan that S.U.V.'s are not safe, something he already knew but chose to ignore. He believes seatbelts and carseats saved his family from harm and regrets ever putting his family at risk by driving an S.U.V.
Exercise: Read the following news stories and write a summary. Your summary should provide an overview of what happened, when and where, who was involved, and what the outcome was. Place checks in the margin next to detail that helps you answer these questions. Underline a few sentences if that helps. Then compose your summary. Your summary should be no longer than six sentences.
Golf Course's Closure Meant to Save Land
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