Identifying Main Ideas and Supporting Ideas

Read each paragraph carefully. Then decide if each sentence represents a main idea (MAIN), a major support (MA), or a minor support (MI). (Note: The first passage is also reprinted in the sixth edition of the text; reviewing it will be useful before completing the remaining exercises.)

1		(1) There are three kinds of book owners. (2) The first has all the standard sets and best-sellers--unread, untouched. (3) (This deluded individual owns wood-pulp and ink, not books.)(4) The second has a great many books--a few of them read through, most of them dipped into, but all of them as clean and shiny as the day they were bought. (5) (This person would probably like to make books his own, but is restrained by a false respect for their physical appearance.) (6) The third has a few books or many--every one of them dog-eared and dilapidated, shaken and loosened by continual use, marked and scribbled in front to back.(7) (This man owns books). --Mortimer Adler, "How to Mark a Book," Saturday Review Label the sentences according to whether each represents the main idea (MAIN), major support (MA), or minor support (MI). Sentence 1 Sentence 2 Sentence 3 Sentence 4 Sentence 5 Sentence 6 Sentence 7
2		[In the next passage, "Jim Crow laws" refer to the systematic practice of segregating and suppressing blacks, common in the first half of this century.] Whatever else it was in 1951, Topeka [Kansas] was also a Jim Crow town. It had been one as long as anyone could remember. There were no separate waiting rooms at the train and bus stations, and Negroes did not have to ride in the back of the local buses, but in most other ways it was segregated by law and, more effectively, by custom. There were eighteen elementary schools for whites and four for blacks. There was one colored hotel, the Dunbar, and all the rest were for whites. Almost no restaurants downtown served colored customers. Before the Second World War, a number of the better beaneries in town had a sign in the window reading: "Negroes and Mexicans served in sacks only," meaning they could take out food in bags but not eat on the premises. One movie theater in town admitted colored people to its balcony. Another, called the Apex, was for colored only. The other five movie houses were for whites only. The swimming pool at Gage Park was off-limits to colored, except one day a year when they were allowed in for a gala picnic. --Richard Kluger, Simple Justice: A History of Brown v. Board of Education Here are the sentences from paragraph 2 rewritten in list form. Label them according to whether each represents the main idea (MAIN), major support (MA), or minor support (MI). a. There were no separate waiting rooms at the train and bus stations, and Negroes did not have to ride in the back of the local buses. b. But in most other ways Topeka was segregated by law and, more effectively, by custom. c. There were eighteen elementary schools for whites and four for blacks. d. There was one colored hotel, the Dunbar, and all the rest were for whites. e. Almost no restaurants served colored customers. f. Before World War II, a number of the better beaneries in town had a sign in the window reading: "Negroes and Mexicans served in sacks only." g. One movie theater in town admitted colored people to its balcony. h. The swimming pool at Gage Park was off-limits to colored, except one day a year when they were allowed in for a gala picnic.
3		(1) Several kinds of material remains are of interest to archeologists. (2) Garbage dumps often reveal a great deal about diet; analysis of coprolites (fossilized feces) also gives information about the ingredients of meals and about whether foods were eaten raw or cooked. (3) Examination of animal bones reveals such things as the average age of animals slaughtered and provides other information useful in determining whether species were wild or domesticated. (4) From such data, archeologists can reconstruct an amazing amount about the economy of the people they study. (5) They can tell whether prehistoric populations were primarily hunters or whether they domesticated and bred animals, killing for food only those animals of a certain age and sex. (6) They can tell if most vegetable food came from collecting wild plants or from sowing, tending, and harvesting crops, that is, plant cultivation. (7) At the site of long-abandoned settlements, archeologists find artifacts, manufactured items. (8) They examine the materials that were used to make these things and discover whether these materials were available locally. (9) If they were not, archeologists attempt to determine where they were available. (10) From such information, ancient trade routes can be reconstructed. --Conrad Phillip Kottak, Cultural Anthropology Label the sentences according to whether each represents the main idea (MAIN), major support (MA), or minor support (MI). Sentence 1 Sentence 2 Sentence 3 Sentence 4 Sentence 5 Sentence 6 Sentence 7 Sentence 8 Sentence 9 Sentence 10