When I taught 5th grade, the students would groan when I said the target skill for the week was inferring. I went along with the feeling, knowing that I had always heard from peers that inferring was a hard skill to teach. Last year, however, when I moved to third grade I had one of those "lightbulb moments". I realized that inferring is something our brains do constantly and naturally, its just we don't recognize that cognitive process as inferring. This de-mystified the process for me, and enabled me to teach the skill much more easily, and my students were able to master the inferring skill.
Normally, when we infer in text we are thinking about a characters actions or motives. A typical inference question could be:
- "How is (the character) feeling when they made that decision?"
- "Why did (the character) do that?
- "What do you think (the character) will say?
We may also infer about the direction the plot will take, or how the plot influences the characters.
- "What will happen when (certain event) occurs?"
- "How will (the character) change because of the (certain event)?"
- "How did (the events) cause (the character) to behave?"
As you can see, inferring requires analysis of events and character far past the level students are expected to do prior to third grade. Inferring, however, links naturally to several other skills, such as making judgements, drawing conclusions, cause and effect, and characterization. I will focus on how all of these skills come together to create strong reading comprehension.
HAVE A GREAT WEEK!!
Mr. Nix
