Getting the Main Idea

Long ago most people couldn’t even write their won names. They just wrote “X” or a cross to stand for their names. Then They kissed the paper it was written on to show that they were sincere. After a long time, “X” came to sand for a person’s signature and also for a

kiss. Today “X” is used as a sign of love.

• The story mainly tells:1. Why people put “X” on their letters

2. How the meaning of “X” has changed

3. Why people couldn’t write their names

4. Why people kiss

Main Idea

One species of fish has a strange appetite. These fish, known as glanis, catch and eat large birds swimming on the surface of the

water. Gulls, geese, and ducks are sometimes found in their stomachs. It seems difficult to believe, doesn’t it? Most often we think of birds eating fish. “Turnabout is fair play,” say the glanis.

• The story mainly tells:1. What most fish eat

2. Why birds eat fish

3. How big the glanis are

4. What the glanis eat

Main Idea

Before the first World War, part of a skull was discovered in Piltdown, England. Some scientists said it was 500,000 years old. Scientists began to think that human beings had been on earth in

their present form longer than had been thought before their wonderful Piltdown discovery. Years later they found out the skull

was a fake. It had just been made to look old.

• The story mainly tells:1. What happened long ago

2. Where Piltdown is

3. What the Piltdown discovery was

4. How a skull looked old

Main Idea

The cat is one of nature’s most amazing animals. It has 288 light bones of incredible strength. It also has 517 springlike muscles. As a

result, the cat almost seems to float into the air when it jumps. Furthermore, it can pick up the direction of a sound ten times faster than a dog can. Its vision is six times better than that of a person.

• The story mainly tells:1. Why cats are unusual

2. How many bones cats have

3. How much cats weigh

4. How well cats can hear

Main Idea