Lesson+Plan

Making inferences Dr. M.
 * Planning**
 * · Reading Comprehension Strategy**

Advancing Reading Development Level for 2nd grade 1. Notemaking occurs when students use the graphic organizer to record personal inferences. 2. Cooperative learning is used when students work as partners to create and record inferences. 3. Questions and cues are used at the beginning of the lesson during teacher-librarian role play to activate and access student's background knowledge and make connections to new learning. 4. Inferring strategy is modeled by educators during think aloud for the beginning and middle of the book. 5. Together, the educators set the learning objectives and created the rubric to provide student feedback.
 * · Reading Development Level**
 * · Research-based Instructional Strategies -** Thorough explanation

This is a 50-minute lesson with options for follow-up collaborations.
 * · Lesson Length**

Our initial goal is to give students a concrete experience which connects inferencing to real life, and to then begin applying this reading strategy to their reading. Students will be able to understand, make inferences and draw conclusions based on text evidence and prior background knowledge. They will connect their understanding to real world situations.
 * · Purpose**

1. Create two inferences with their partner which are related to the end of the story. Standard addressed: ELA TEK 2.9 Students understand, make inferences and draw conclusions about the structure and elements of fiction and provide evidence from text to support their understanding. 2. Construct a personal inference which is related to their own life. Standard addressed: ELA TEK 2.19F Students make connections to own experiences, to ideas in other texts, and to the larger community and discuss textual evidence.
 * · Objectives**

3. Record the two reading inferences and the personal inference on their reading strategy graphic organizer. Standard addressed: ELA TEK 2.19F Students make connections to own experiences, to ideas in other texts, and to the larger community and discuss textual evidence.

4. Examine the Twitter feed for replies to our tweet and relate the responses to our unit of study. Standard addressed: ELA TEK 2.16A Students recognize different purposes of media (e.g., informational, entertainment);

1. SEE THE OCEAN by Estelle Condra, illustrated by... (This is important for picture books.) 2. IF YOU LISTEN by Charlotte Zolotow Educators will model this Inference Riddle Game at the close of the lesson. The link will then be placed into Edmodo for students to practice the strategy of inferring for homework. (For me, this game is misnamed. These are not inferences; they are deductive reasoning games. In a true inference, you do not know the outcomes. The theme of a story is made my inference. It "resides" between the lines when the reader combines her background knowledge with evidence in the text. It should be logical but it is not directly stated as in the answers to these riddles. )
 * Resources **
 * Children’s or Young Adult Literature (fiction and informational books) **
 * Websites (including pathfinders)**


 * Graphic organizers**

Teacher: 1. White construction paper--one per partnership and writing instruments 2. Copy of SEE THE OCEAN and IF YOU LISTEN books. 3. Camera to post Twitter question. 4. Create two inferences for beginning of SEE THE OCEAN story to share during think aloud. 5. Have kids paired into partnerships prior to the lesson. 6. Bring sharpened pencils and white boards (for hard writing surface) for each student.
 * Materials**

Teacher-Librarian: 1. Schedule the library's lesson space for the collaborative reading lesson. 2. Setup the document camera and projector for the Think Aloud. 3. White board to model thinking during the Think Aloud. 4. Create two inferences for middle of SEE THE OCEAN to share during think aloud. 5. Negotiate with three Twitter pals to be ready to respond to our lesson's Twitter question on inferring. 6. CD of IF YOU LISTEN and CD player. 7. Copies of the graphic organizer and the rubric assessment for each student. 1. Document Camera (librarian) 2. Projector (librarian) 3. Dry-erase markers (teacher) 4. Phone (to tweet) (teacher) 5. Conch Shell (librarian) 6. CD Player (librarian)
 * Equipment**


 * · Collaboration**

Teacher-Librarian (PRIOR TO LESSON): Teacher-librarian sends a tweet out three days prior to lesson. The tweet will ask other teachers and librarians (who follow the librarian's feed) to share their personal experiences with inferring. These tweets will be sent to @OurClass and available to view with the students during the lesson. The teacher-librarian will STILL send a tweet out at the beginning of the lesson, but ALSO sending it out three days prior assures there will be some responses to the tweet. It's important to have responses ready prior to the lesson, so the kids have responses to read from the Twitter feed. Good strategy for maximizing the responses.

1. JOINT Role-play: Teacher will be child in role play. Teacher-librarian will be parent in role play. MOTIVATION/INTRODUCTION At the launch of the lesson, we’ll begin with a motivational game to help them understand why inferring is so necessary. We’ll role-play a mom (or dad) getting more and more upset with a child who is interrupting their phone call. The parent's voice will get firm. They'll politely ask the child to wait. They'll snap their fingers and point to the child with a shake of the head "no." Finally, they'll give "the look", but the child will STILL not pick up on the cues. It will continue until the parent hangs up and the child has to go to their room, very confused. Then, we’ll open it up to the kids to ask "When did YOU know the child was going to get into trouble?" Through the teacher’s exaggerated “parent” role play, the kids will know the cues which the teacher playing the student “missed.” We'll then explain: "This is why inferring is so important. It helps you as a thinker. You pick up the unknown information." YES! 2. Librarian will lead the inferring conversation from the role-play.

3. Teacher will complete the conch shell motivator. Teacher will listen to the ocean in the conch shell and then pass the shell around for students to hear the ocean, even though they cannot see it. In the book, the little girl sees the ocean, even though she is blind. She uses her other senses.

MODELING ( PRESENTATION ) 4. JOINT Think Aloud: both educators will read and model inferring. Teacher will read the beginning of the story, sharing two inferences. Teacher-librarian will read the middle of the story, sharing two inferences. Both will record the inferring process on the graphic organizer: Text Evidence + Background Knowledge = Inference NOTE: This is the lesson guided example. Students will have the same graphic organizer to complete.

5. Teacher: finish reading SEE THE OCEAN and pause the story at two stop and think points.

GUIDED PRACTICE 7. JOINT: At stop and think points, students can work in partners to create an inference. Partnerships will create two inferences related to the end of the story. Both the teacher and Librarian circulate and give feedback on the inferences created in the partnerships.

8. JOINT: Co-lead sharing discussion after each stop and think. Add student inferences to teacher example. Discuss story resolution as final stop and think.

10. JOINT: Librarian checks Twitter feed and leads discussion with students on personal connections to inferring. Teacher completes final inference on the example graphic organizer. 11. JOINT: Students add their personal inference to their graphic organizer. Teacher and librarian are walking around and conferring with partnerships to check and give feedback to the students about their personal inference.

12. JOINT Librarian: Plays IF YOU LISTEN and shows pictures as students listen to audio CD. Teacher and librarian share their inferences at the beginning of the story. Teacher and librarian then invite students to raise their hands to share their own inferences for the middle and end of the story. Librarian will pause the CD three times for sharing. Teacher and librarian will both call upon students to share, plus guide students to follow the TEXT EVIDENCE + BACKGROUND KNOWLEDGE = INFERENCE pattern from the think aloud. After listening to the story, students can ask any final questions about either book. Teacher and librarian lead the students in a discussion to compare the stories and overarching inferences, which leads to understanding themes. This is an extension of the inferring lesson and is part of the discussion, but is not focused upon in the guided practice or assessment.

12. JOINT: Teacher and Librarian co-lead an assessment of the guided example with the whole group. The students and educators read the rubric and then check the guided practice work example. The "Composing a Tweet" category is demonstrated and scored during the assessment, since this will be an interactive piece done as a closing activity. Points Grading Scale: 11 to 12 = A 9 to 10 = B 7 to 8 = C 6 = D 5 or less = F (reteach)

13. JOINT: Students self-assess with the rubric and both educators walk around and conference as students finish assessment. While waiting for one of the educators, students complete an "on the back" inferring exercise for IF YOU LISTEN. On the back of their graphic organizer, they construct their own inferences from the second story. This is an extension and will not be graded, but the educators can check it as time permits.

14. JOINT: As students complete their graphic organizer and rubric, they pose for a partnership picture with the I-Phone. The partners decide which inference (from either story) to share on the class' Twitter feed. They give an oral response, which the teacher or librarian tweets out along with their picture. Students rate final Twitter category. In some schools, you would not be allowed to post recognizable photos of students online. Be sure to check the district policy and/or send home permission forms for parents' signatures.

15. JOINT: Final conferences. Teacher and teacher-librarian confer with partnerships to discuss final scores and collect work. Each partnership only meets with one of the teachers, so the conferences only take half the time than if there were only one teacher. Brava!

16. JOINT: Together, share the inferring riddle game (linked above). Play one round, taking turns with guesses as a demonstration for students. Kids can then play the game for homework. The teacher will place the link into the class' Edmodo classroom. Responsibilities for assessment: -both educators will monitor partner conversations and make informal observations to determine if students are accurately using information to make inferences prior to self-assessing with the rubric -both educators are responsible for conferencing with students as they complete the teacher-student shared rubric
 * · Assessment**

Tools: -graphic organizer -shared rubric for students and educators

2nd Grade Language Arts TEKS §110.13. English Language Arts and Reading, Grade 2 Intro In second grade, students will engage in activities that build on their prior knowledge and skills in order to strengthen their reading, writing, and oral language skills. (9) Reading/Comprehension of Literary Text/Fiction. Students understand, make inferences and draw conclusions about the structure and elements of fiction and provide evidence from text to support their understanding. Students are expected to: (B) describe main characters in works of fiction, including their traits, motivations, and feelings. 2nd Grade Language Arts TEK 2.19F Students make connections to own experiences, to ideas in other texts, and to the larger community and discuss textual evidence.
 * · Standards (from the TEKS or other state standards)**
 * Reading and/or writing**
 * Listening and speaking**
 * Other content areas**

AASL Standards, Strands, and Indicators Standard 1: Inquire, think critically, and gain knowledge 1.1 Skills 1.1.2 Use prior knowledge as context for new learning. 1.1.6 Read, view, and listen for information presented in any format (e.g., textual, visual, media, digital) in order to make inferences and gather meaning. Standard 4: Pursue personal and aesthetic growth. 4.3 Responsibilities 4.3.1 Participate in the social exchange of ideas, both electronically and in person.

Conch shell activity and Teacher-librarian role-play. (Both are described in the collaboration description above.)
 * Implementation**
 * **Process**
 * Motivation**

1. Make personal connections to our stories. 2. Use the story and your connections to construct inferences. 3. Pose for a picture with your partner. 4. Compose a Tweet to share with our friends.
 * Student-friendly objectives**

Students sit with their partners. Pass out the white boards, pencils and graphic organizers. The teacher and teacher-librarian will read parts of the story SEE THE OCEAN for a think aloud: //I'm thinking, what does this text remind me of?// //When I read this story, I remember...and now I know...// //This part of the story makes me think of...so now I can infer...// They will complete the graphic organizer as a joint activity to demonstrate correct completion to the students. Students work together to complete the graphic organizer as the teacher and teacher-librarian finish the story. The second story, IF YOU LISTEN, is shared as an audio CD. The educators jointly lead a discussion of this book and a comparison between the two books. Students raise hands to share their inferences for IF YOU LISTEN.
 * Presentation**

1. Raise hands to share a connection. 2. Follow the inferring pattern. 3. With partner, share connections to the story. 4. Using text evidence and connection, construct inferences. 5. Raise hand when complete. A teacher will come and check your work with you.
 * Student practice procedures**

The teacher and teacher-libarian will circulate as the partners are working to offer feedback as they are writing and sharing with one another.
 * Guided practice**

Jointly, they will conduct final conferences, take partner pictures for Twitter and record the tweet the partners would like to share. The inferring game is the last activity and students leave the lesson with a follow up homework assignment.
 * Closure**

How can we help kids connect their personal knowledge to their understanding of the text? How does collaboration make this process more easily achievable?
 * Reflection**

We think working with a partner gives students a mirror into two different ways of thinking. They can begin to realize that, even though our background knowledge is not the same, we can construct similar and accurate inferences. Science: Use "Feeling Boxes" to place objects inside. Kids can touch, but not see. They must determine the contents of the Feeling Box.
 * **Extensions**

This is fine, but actually it's a prediction activity rather than an inference activity because students can actually learn the answer. An inference is never known for certain.