Read the excerpt below from Interview with Marielle Tsukamoto and answer the question that follows. I think the saddest memory is the day we had to leave our farm. I know my mother and father were worried. They did not know what would happen to us. We had no idea where we would be sent. People were all crying and many families were upset. Some believed we would not be treated well, and maybe killed. There were many disturbing rumors. Everyone was easily upset and there were many arguments. It was a horrible experience for all of us, the old people like my grandparents, my parents and children like me. We were all innocent. The government had no real reason to send us into these camps. There were racists who did not want the Japanese to own land and begin to prosper. Racism, prejudice, greed, and lack of political leadership caused the evacuation and internment. In writing, walk through the process of finding the main idea. Then, describe the main idea of the excerpt and why it is central.

The central or main idea either refers to the point or purpose of a paragraph or it refers to the summary of a piece of writing. These two concepts are closely related in a piece of writing because the point of each paragraph should contribute to the point of the entire piece of writing. In order to discover the point or purpose of a paragraph, one must first identify the topic of the piece of writing. Then, one must identify the structure or medium used to discuss the topic. Finally, for a paragraph, one should identify the sentences that the other sentences seem to support, and for an entire text, one should identify the statement or idea that the paragraphs seem to discuss or support. When this process is applied to the excerpt from An Interview with Marielle Tsukamoto, I come up with the following answers:

Topic: Japanese internment

Structure: Interview

Central Idea: "I think the saddest memory is the day we had to leave our farm."

Why: The first sentence is the main idea because the sentences that follow it support it. The first few sentences explain why the memory is so devastating. The last few sentences explain that the most devastating aspect was that the family was forced to leave for no legal or just reason.

Explanation:

answer: make the students take turns and express their opinions in 30 second intervals

explanation: in montessori schools we do this in socratic discussions