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Please write a summary of one of the TED talks from the playlist of the top 25 most popular talks. You will find this playlist on www.ted.com (Links to an external site.) down towards the bottom where the playlists are located. You may pick any one of the talks that you want, so find one that touches on a subject that you’re interested in.A summary is a brief restatement in your own words of the main ideas of a piece of writing. A good summary is:Brief. The summary should be no longer than one page. So, use the most concise language you can. Do not repeat an idea, even if the original article does so.Accurate. The summary must contain the main ideas of the original and no ideas that are not in the original. The summary writer is not responsible for the quality of those ideas, but she is responsible for representing them fairly without opinion.Objective. You have to keep your own opinions out of the summary, even in such subtle ways as writing, “Smith’s best point is….” or “Jones is trying to prove….” The latter would imply that he is not successful at proving it.Use These Parts in Your Summary:Title. If you give the title of the talk and the speaker’s name is in the title, that essential information is quickly and easily understood by your reader. Here is an example title: Summary of “Nuclear Winter” by Carl Sagan (Sagan is the writer of the original, not the writer of the summary. You are the writer of the summary.) If the speake

r’s name is NOT in the title, please be sure to include it in your summary.Early Sentence Thesis. The thesis of the talk should appear early in the summary, sometimes even as the first sentence, whether or not the original speaker used a thesis statement. You will have to watch the talk (perhaps more than once) to figure out what the main idea is. Try to put the thesis statement in your own words. If you must quote, do so only if there is no other option. If you do quote, be sure to use quotation marks and a parenthetical citation.Main points of the talk. Don’t repeat ideas. Omit examples and details. Try to keep the emphasis the same as in the original.Do NOT include your own conclusion. When you cover that last point, stop. Summing up is more graceful, but the goal here is brevity, not grace.Follow these steps when writing your summary:Watch your selected TED talk at least twice; once to hear the talk, and a second time to listen for main ideas.Note/list/outline the important words/phrases/ideas.Use the important words/phrases/ideas to generate a summary.Add a topic sentence/thesis statement that appears early in the summary to capture the central points.MLA format for your paper will consist of the following header at the top of the first page, left-aligned:Your NameKatie Sandy-Smith (your instructor’s name)ENG 221DateThen, center your title on the next line and start writing. The summary essay should be evenly double-spaced throughout.