Scaffold & Support: Making Inferences Anchor Charts

Are some of your students plateauing in the area of reading comprehension? They can give you a basic re-tell, but when it comes to developing ideas about the character or determining the author's lesson, they're struggling. How can we best support students in making good inferences?

Just like any phonics structured literacy lesson, we’re not leaving it up to chance: direct, explicit teacher modeling. Show students exactly how you figured out your new idea. And then provide students with many, many opportunities to practice with constructive feedback.

Let’s break down the process of making an inference:

1. Noticing important details in the text.

This might include a character action, dialogue, feeling, or thought. Maybe it’s a change in setting.  Perhaps it's an important fact that is the key to the author's purpose in writing an informational article. Whatever that detail is, we model to students how we notice it. Students have a tendency to steam-roll through a text, especially if they’re fluent decoders.

2. Make a connection to background knowledge and experiences.

This connection is key to developing a new idea. Without a strong foundation of background knowledge, it will be a challenge to develop this new idea. How can a student conclude that a character is ‘selfish’ if it’s never been defined for him or if he’s never experienced the impact of a ‘selfish’ person?  How can a student determine the benefits of animal adaptations for survival if

3. Draw a conclusion that is not directly stated in the text.

Show students how you’re able to figure out character traits, author’s lessons, thoughts, feelings, make predictions, infer tricky words (and much, much more) because you have a process for inferring these ideas. Model this thinking for your students, and over time, with lots of practice, they will grow in this area as well. 

Making Inferences Anchor Charts & Graphic Organizers are a "think aloud" of the process of inferring while reading. Differentiated versions of the graphic organizers allow students to practice the inferencing skill during their independent reading.

Anchor charts break down the following types of inferences:

• making a prediction
• inferring the character's thoughts and feelings
• inferring the meaning of an unknown word
• drawing a new conclusion about the text (especially nonfiction)
• determining the author's lesson

And if there are other posters that you would like for me to add on to this resource, please let me know!! Best way to reach me is via DM on Instagram.

Our good modeling and explicit instruction will lead to students strengthening their critical thinking skills.