As you look for main and supporting ideas in an article, it may help to think of them as “snapshots” from a single event. For example, suppose your friends take lots of pictures at your birthday party. You had such a good time that you decide to select your favorite photo to print and frame, knowing it will remind you of that happy day. What photo would you choose to represent the experience--a picture of you and your friends dancing and throwing confetti or one of you opening a present from your little brother? You would want the photo that best captures your overall experience of the event--one that you can show family and friends to illustrate your main impression of the day.
When you need to identify the main and supporting ideas in an article, you should look for big-picture impressions--not minor details. The article “Without Independence, Freedom Is Just a Word” is divided into sections, each with its own subhead, and these subheads can help you predict what supporting ideas might help form its “big picture.” Click the button below to skim through the article and read the heading for each section. See if you can predict what idea will be developed in each section, based on its heading.
Did reading the subheadings help you predict some of the article’s topics? Compare your thoughts to those of other students. Click each heading title below to read a suggestion for how to interpret each section heading.
Forty acres and one mule might be all that a former slave could own at the time, or maybe it is what former slaves were given. |
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“Codes” might refer to new laws or rules that were created just for African Americans. Reconstruction is the name for the period that immediately followed the Civil War, so maybe the laws were created during that time. |
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Since the article is about the practice of sharecropping, maybe the author will argue that it was simply another form of slavery. |
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This heading suggests that former slaves and sharecroppers may join forces and demand a better solution. |
