The document discusses main ideas and supporting details. It defines the main idea as what a paragraph is about and supporting details as details that help understand the main idea by answering who, what, when, where questions. It provides an example paragraph about a boy with weird parents who do strange things in public, with details about the mother talking about the boy's belly button and father asking him to walk like a chicken.

1. Main Ideas &
Supporting Details

2. What is a “Main Idea?”
The main idea of a
paragraph is what all the
sentences are about.

3. What are Supporting Details?
Supporting details help you to better
understand the main idea.
Supporting details answer the questions of
who, what, when and where.

4. There once was
a boy who had
weird parents.
No matter how
many times he told
them not to, the
weird parents did
weird things
whenever they went
out into the world.

5. There once was
a boy who had
weird parents.
No matter how
many times he told
them not to, the
weird parents did
weird things
whenever they went
out into the world.

6. The weird
mother always
talked about the
boy as if he
wasn’t there.
“My son has a belly
button that sticks
out. No one else in
our family has one
like it.”

7. The weird
mother always
talked about the
boy as if he
wasn’t there.
“My son has a belly
button that sticks
out. No one else in
our family has one
like it.”

8. And the weird
father always
asked the boy to do
something silly.
“Walk like a
chicken,” he’d say.
Of course the boy
wouldn’t, so the
weird father did it
instead.

9. And the weird
father always
asked the boy to
do something
silly.
“Walk like a
chicken,” he’d say.
Of course the boy
wouldn’t, so the
weird father did it
instead.

10. Why do we need
supporting details?
 Supporting details help you get a better picture
of the story.
 They give you more information.
 This information helps you understand what
you are reading.

11. What main idea can you see
going on here?

12. What details support that idea?