Wednesday, February 16, 2011

"Tagging" the Main Idea

Readers,

Many of you have heard about the unrest in Egypt right now. Perhaps your parents have been watching the news coverage or discussing the problem at home. As a child, you might be confused or unsure what is really happening. When it comes to important issues around the world, especially those in unfamiliar areas, adults can feel the same way as well.

One way we gain information about world events is through reading news articles. Read this article about Egypt. If you wish, discuss it with your parents.

We have been working on finding the main idea when we read - what a story/article is mostly about. To help us with this, I want us to look at a digital tool called "tagging". When bloggers and other writers submit online articles, they can "tag", or label, the most important words and phrases. This allows people who are searching for specific information to locate their articles easily online. When writers "tag" words in their article, they think of the most important words and phrases, ones that stand out the most, and the words that show what the article is really about. In other words, online writers "tag" their Main Idea words.

What words would YOU tag from the Egypt article? What words stick out as really important? After reading the article, comment here about the words YOU would tag in the article and explain why. I have given you an example below and tagged words from the blog I just wrote.

29 comments:

PB said...

I would tag protestors, state of emergency, resignation, and democracy. Mubarak kept Egypt in a constant state of emergency. The people protested against him and wanted him to resign. These words describe the chaos in Cairo, Egypt. Resignation of the president was the only solution to make the people happy. Democracy is also an important tag word because freedom is what the people want.

cs said...

I would tag, protesters in Egypt have called for the country's President to step down. I would tag that because it is part of the main idea. I would also tag, Hosni Mubarak has stepped down from office. I would tag this because it is the other part of the main idea. The last thing i would tag is, Mubarak has kept Egypt in a state of emergency. I tagged this because that is the main reason why Egypt wants Mubarak out of office.

kate said...

After reading the article about Egypt, the words that I think are the most important and the reason that I would tag these words are:

1. Democracy - Egypt is becoming a democracy.

2. transition - since the President has stepped down and the country has not yet chosen a new President they are in a time of transition.

3. resigned - the President was forced to step down by the people of Egypt.

4. protest - the people of Egypt protested the President and forced him to step down.

HJF said...

In this artical i thought that im portant words that stood out to me and helped me learn more were,
>Hosni Mubarak
>Egypt
>resighned
>democracy
>elections
>middle east
>U.S. President, and
>political
these were main idea words and important words to me because they helped me understand more about what is going on in the story and learn more they also told about what is happening in Egypt.

HCF said...

I would tag, and these are just some of them, resigned, carefully, democracy, and elections, because these are some words that helped me understand what I was reading and understand the main ideas of the paragraphs. I got a little confused at first so I just looked around for good, helpful, understanding words to help me. I want to point out one thing, resigned, because I automatically new that that ment, for someone to drop out, and that that for sure the main idea of the paragraph.

Anonymous said...

I picked democracy for one of my words because Hosni Mubarak wouldn't let Egypt vote in a fair way. A phrase I chose was: Egypt needs a new president because he has been in the office for thirty years and the country needs jobs and more freedom. Another word I picked was resigned. Hosni Mubarak finally resigned after a long time in the office!

GS said...

Two words that tagged me from the Egypt article was resigned because it was in bold and it was an important part in the article. The second tag was when Obama said,"It's the beginning," that really hit me because that is what started this whole issue.

ES said...

I would "tag" the words resigned, protesters, democracy, and elections. I would "tag" the word resigned because President Hosni Mubarak has resigned from being president and this article tells you about why and how he resigned.
I also would "tag" the word protesters because there were many protesters when Mubarak was still president but now most of them have calmed down.
I would have "tagged" the word democracy because in the article they said, "Egypt has become a true democracy." The word democracy means an election for the people to vote for government.
If I wrote the article I would have "tagged" the word elections because they are scheduled to have another election in September. Election is when people go and vote for the people running for government or just a simple vote.
These are the words that I would have
"tagged."

KS said...

I decided that I would do a tag for each paragraph of the first article.
1.Mubarak resigned.
2.Protesters demanded and new president.
3.Mubarak said he would not run in September's elections.
4.But the Egyptians wanted him to resign immediately.
5.The 30 year state of emergency limited the people's rights.
6.Egypt's military said they would transfer "toward a free democratic community".

PF said...

Words and phrases that I tagged from the Egypt article are: resigned, Mubarak, Egypt, protesters, Hosni Mubarak has been resigned. All of those words and that one phrase seemed to stand out to me to support the main idea.

BT said...

The words I choose to tag are...

• resigned
•protests
• mobs and Obama

I chose resigned because that is what the protests were about.
I chose protests because the protests were what made Mubarak dicide to leave.
I chose mobs because before Mubarak decided to leave, mobs of people crowded the street yelling hoping that maybe he would here them.
I chose Obama because while the protests were going on Obama was trying to talk to Mubarak about leaving, and I guess it worked.

BT

BT said...

The words I choose to tag are...

• resigned
•protests
• mobs and Obama

I chose resigned because that is what the protests were about.
I chose protests because the protests were what made Mubarak dicide to leave.
I chose mobs because before Mubarak decided to leave, mobs of people crowded the street yelling hoping that maybe he would here them.
I chose Obama because while the protests were going on Obama was trying to talk to Mubarak about leaving, and I guess it worked.

BT

EGT said...

These are the words that stand out to me, government,presidential, democratic, protesters, fredom, and legally. Those words stand out to me because, those words describe what the story is about and gives me visual thought about it.

PB said...

After reading the article about Egypt I tagged these words.

Protest

Resigned

Democracy

State of Emergency


I chose protest because there have been many protest in Egypt.
I chose resigned because it was an important part in this cause riot.
I chose democracy because that is what Egypt is turning into.
I chose state of emergency because that has what Egypt has been in for quite some time now and it had ended.

AC said...

Egypt is asking for their president to step down.After reading the article about eygept, the protesters demanded for more freedom, more jobs, and for a new president. Some words that standed out to me theat i found were,

declaring

demorcracy

resigned

elections

mideast

AC said...

Egypt is asking for their president to step down.After reading the article about eygept, the protesters demanded for more freedom, more jobs, and for a new president. Some words that standed out to me theat i found were,

declaring

demorcracy

resigned

elections

mideast

Mh said...

Here are some words I chose to "tag".
Resigned-because Mubarak resigned
Mubarak-he was the president
Cairo, Egypt-it was the country it took place in
Democracy-Egypt hopes to be a democracy
A phrase I chose to tag is
Protesters demand change

SMD said...

Main idea: The people in Egypt have finally gotten what they wanted when President Mubarak resigned as Egypt's president.
Supporting main points:
RESIGNED-Mubarak resigned his duties as president.
EMERGENCY- President Mubarak has been making his latest votes unfair giving himself advantages.
RESULTS- The people of Egypt like the results of President Mubarak resigning.
TEMPORARILY- For a period of time President Mubarak’s Vice President will be taking presidential orders.
RESPONED- President Mubarak responded to the Egyptians by feeding their hunger for change.
Democracy- The Egyptian nation will now have a democracy. Now they will be able to vote on the political decisions.

HS said...

After reading that article here are some words I would tag are:
- resigned
-Hosni Mubarak
-democratic
-democracy

Olivia said...

Some of the words I tagged were:
. Hosni Mubarak: because he was the president who the Egyptians were angry about.
. Resigned: because Mubarak stepped down from office.
. Democracy: because the U.S. president hopes that Egypt will get to vote for their OWN president.
. Freedom: because Egypt will be free from the president

eb said...

I would tag these words because I think they are the most important:
.Protesters
.resigned
.democracy

LA said...

Some of the words that I would tag are: Resigned because the President wasn't treating the country fairly and finally stepped down. Another word I would use is Chanted because it shows their emotion against them. Also I would use the phrase "The streets were filled with cheers" because it shows their reaction when he stepped down. Another is Democracy because it's a hopeful future for Egypt. My last word is Election because the had elections against the president. Another reason why I would do Election is because they will have to do elections for the new president.

MS said...

The words I would tag are...

protest: The people of egypt protested because thay wanted Mubarak gone.

resigned: Mubarak stepped down.

democracy: I think the people in Eygypt should be able to have a democracy.

Those word just really struck me as I read the article. I have to say, in the pictures the president looks really mean (probaly because everyone wanted him gone.)

BW said...

I would tag these words from this article... protest because the people Mubarak to leave, resign because Mubarak stepped down from his job, and democracy because the people will choose the new president. I would add bloody because these few weeks have probably been bloody, riots because it said people filled the streets.

JS said...

Protest in Egypt.
President Hosni Mubarak.
Egypt's President will not run for re-election.
Egypt's President has been in office for 30 year.

These words are important because it explain why the citizens want him out of office. These words would help people find information about what is happening in Egypt, if they did a search online.

Anonymous said...

These are the words that I think should be "tagged" in the article about Egypt, they are:

1. Democracy - The state is becoming a democracy.

2. Egypt - This is all happening in Egypt, and President Murbarak is the President of Egypt.

3. Resigned - He has stepped down and is not the President anymore.

4. Protesters - The protesters wanted the President to step down, and they were unhappy with the President.

OO said...

These are the words I would tag from the article.

Egypt,Riots, and president.

These words I chose because they were the main idea. I chose Egypt because that's where it's all taking place.Riots because there are riots in the streets and presedent because he is the one cutting job, raising taxes and they want a new presedent.

OO said...

These are the words I would tag from the article.

Egypt,Riots, and president.

These words I chose because they were the main idea. I chose Egypt because that's where it's all taking place.Riots because there are riots in the streets and presedent because he is the one cutting job, raising taxes and they want a new presedent.

LL said...

after reading the article i found some words.

protesting

resigh

democracy

protesters were forcing the president to step down and they want a new president.