Overall I thought that my three lessons went well. They were the first three lessons of my unit, so I was introducing the concept of making inferences, and we practiced it based on pulling out character traits. My students seemed to enjoy learning, and enjoy the stories we were reading as well. Overall I think that students really understood what inferring was and how to do it. This was mainly due to the first introductory lesson where I had a bag of “stuff” and we, as a class, made inferences of the mysterious person based on the things. For example, there was cough syrup, so we may infer that the person was a little sick. Students really enjoyed this practical introduction. We then practiced making inferences about characters with the narrative picture book, The Paper Bag Princess. I modeled for them how to make the inferences using the text and what they know to infer. I think that the majority of the students got it and understood the overall objective of the lesson. Students were really pulling out character traits that reflected the personality of the main character through inferring. I feel like the biggest thing that students struggled with during my lessons was not the making inferences part, but rather the justifying part. Students were asked to provide evidence for the inferences they were making as well as identify not only what the text says, but also what they know. This was the area where my students struggled the most. An alternate read of my students performance may be because making inferences is not new to them. They have been making inferences in past grades. For example pulling out character traits. What was a bit new for them way the justifying. That is where they struggled a bit. I learned quite a bit about my students literacy practices that extended beyond my objectives not only in these three lessons, but also in my unit overall. Students were connecting the inferring beyond the text to their everyday lives. This is not something that I expected. Students were also practicing during readers workshop and pulling out specific character traits. None of these things were explicitly stated in the text. I also learned that my students really do well in the turn-and-talks, where they are asked to confer with a partner and and share their thinking. From walking around the class during these discussions, I was able to really see how students were comparing their thoughts, disagreeing with each other, and then better able to justify saying “I think this because...” For a couple groups I had to prompt, why do you think that, but overall I was very impressed with my students partner discussions. For re-teaching the material to students who need additional support, I have a couple ideas. Through my assessments, as well as my informal observations, I have identified a small group of students who are just not getting the justification aspect of inferring. What I am planning to do is during Reader's workshop pull that group for additional instruction. I want the students to understand that they already make inferences all the time in life and in their reading, that now we are just asking them to think a little bit more about why they think that. With this group I will read an additional text to them, all the while modeling and thinking aloud making inferences about characters. Then I plan to scaffold the students and let them think about inferences from specific lines in the text and finally have them make inferences with their own text. I will only be focusing on making inferences about characters rather then making inferences and predicting. When they have the character aspect down, then I will move on with them. If I were to do the same lesson again, there are a few things I would do to improve overall students learning. I do not think that in the beginning of the lesson I explicitly stated the purpose for making inferences, nor explicitly said “this is how we make inferences” and modeled for them. Rather I stated what inferring was and then let them go. And they made the inferences, but did not follow the process of taking specifically what a character says or does and what they know to infer. I feel like if at the beginning I had made that a bit clearer, it might have helped. I also feel like my students would have benefited from additional modeling and me thinking out loud before I expected them to jump right in there.
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