Week Five: Chapter 5 Learning to Make an Inference

In Chapter 5 Kylene Beers cites two classroom interactions, one with an 11^th grade Honors English class and another with an 11^th grade English class with struggling readers (pgs. 66-68). I found the difference in the discussions to be startling. I was first surprised at the quality of the Honors students’ discussion. Although it got a little silly at times the kids were feeding off each other and responding to other’s inferences. There was very little teacher prompting which is ideal in a classroom discussion. They were able to get a lot out of a small portion of a text. It was very student centered because they took control of the discussion while the teacher merely prompted and observed. On the other hand the struggling readers immediately shut down after reading the text. Although there was only one teacher prompt cited at the beginning the discussion went nowhere. It seemed once one student got confused and frustrated the rest chimed in their similar confusion as well. They had a hard time making inferences because they were only looking for what was directly stated in the text. Since the text said nothing about a movie or tickets they dismissed it as a possibility. The last sentence of this transcription, said by a student, struck me the most “This is stupid” (pg. 68). When working with struggling readers it is amazing how quick this phrase gets uttered and the shutdown immediately follows. It can be the most challenging to work with these students. I cannot count how many times I have heard students say that phrase while working at my internship. Unless you can figure out a way to get them engaged and understand the assignment you’ve lost them. That is one of the most helpless feelings for a teacher.

To help students draw inferences from a text I think a teacher should first teach what an inference is so that they know what they are supposed to be doing. A good introductory activity could be showing students movie trailers and having them describe what they think the movie will be about. By using a visual representation it is much less intimidating than a text but it still gets the point across. The teacher can first model what they want the students to do by showing a trailer and then scripting her thoughts, her inferences, about the movie. Then they can try it on their own. Students will infer who will be the main characters, the setting, the plot, etc. All of these things can be derived from a novel or portion of text as well. I think this would be an excellent bridge to learning how to use inferences with a text. This could work in a potential classroom because it relates to students’ lives. Kids make inferences all the time when watching movie trailers to decide if they will go see the film, they just don’t realize it. The teacher could show a variety of trailers that are popular among the students to pique their interest as well.  I think some potential challenges could be students losing sight of what they are supposed to be doing in the activity and merely watch the trailers. I also think some students will excel at this but then not see the connection between making an inference using the trailer and making an inference with a text. The teacher will need to be explicit in order to help students make the connection.  Another potential challenge could be that some students still just won’t get it which I think is a possibility with any activity a teacher implements. These students will require extra help and instruction from the teacher and possibly more examples modeled for them.