COMPREHENSION LESSON PLAN: Making Inferences
JMU Elementary Education Program
 Kirstin Warne
 Kellie Sawyer at John Wayland Elementary
 Presented: November 19, 2014 at 10:00 a.m.
A. Comprehension: Making Inferences with Turkey Trouble by Wendi Silvano
B. CONTEXT OF LESSON
In my practicum class my cooperating teacher reads aloud to her students every day. While my
cooperating teacher is reading she asks her students questions about the story. She asks her students to
predict what they think will happen in the story and what they think will happen next. The context of
this lesson is to build off the students’ knowledge of predictions in order to understand how to infer.
The students have not studied how to make inferences, thus I will ask them leading inference based
questions during the read aloud. The students will begin to infer what is happening in the story through
using the evidence given through the text and illustrations. Each student will be given a white board
and dry erase marker to draw what they think the turkey will turn into next.
C. LEARNING OBJECTIVES
Objective 1
Each student will contribute at least one evidencebased prediction at the beginning of the read aloud.
Objective 2
Each student will contribute at least one evidence-based
inference during the read aloud.
D. ASSESSING LEARNING
I am going to assess my first and second objectives by audio recording my students’ responses and
then recording those responses on my observation assessment sheet. The observation assessment sheet
will have a place for each student’s response, and next to the response there are three different
categories, 1) Understands 2) Some Understanding 3) No Understanding. Depending on the student’s
response I will place a check mark in one of the three categories.
E. RELATED VIRGINIA STANDARDS OF LEARNING
K.9 The student will demonstrate comprehension of fictional texts.
c) Use pictures to make predictions.
F.MATERIALS NEEDED
 Turkey Trouble by Wendi Silvano
 Whiteboards
 Dry-erase markers
 Audio recorder
 Turkey papers
 Pencil boxes
 My note cards
G. PROCEDURE
Before
Before I begin the read aloud I will have each
student grab a whiteboard and a dry-erase marker
and have them take a seat on the reading carpet.
Once the students are all seated I will hold up the
book. I will read them the title and ask the students
if they have ever read the book before. If some
students say yes I will ask them to not give
anything away while I read and ask questions.
Estimated Time Duration: 45 minutes
5 minutes
I will then ask the students if they could predict
what they think the story will be about by looking
at the cover and by reading the title.
During
During the lesson I will ask the students inference
questions.
Estimated Time Left: 40 minutes
Beginning of book:
 Why is turkey in big trouble?
 What do you think Turkey’s idea is going
to be?
Middle of book:
Now I will have the students share their ideas of
what they think Turkey’s idea is.
During the story the students will draw on their
whiteboards what they think Turkey will turn into
next.

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20 minutes for
reading
Draw a picture a picture of what you think
turkey will turn into next.
Touch your nose if you think you know
what turkey will turn into next.
What do you think will happen next?
Why wouldn’t a farmer eat a horse for
Thanksgiving?
Did Turkey actually look like a horse?
Before I read the end of the story, which tells
Turkey’s last disguise, I will ask the students to
head back to their seats to create their own Turkey
disguise. I will stop at the place where turkey has
thought of his last idea. Turkey was last seen in the
garden holding a tomato.
What do you think Turkey is going to dress up
as next?
15 minutes to create
their turkey disguise
After
Estimated Time Left: 5 minutes
The students will then come back to the reading
carpet for the end of the story.
I will ask them if the disguise they gave Turkey
was the same idea Turkey had in the book.
5 minutes for
finishing story and
sharing their pictures
H. WHAT COULD GO WRONG WITH THIS LESSON AND WHAT WILL YOU DO ABOUT IT?

I could lose track of time and not have time to finish the lesson. If this happens I will finish the lesson
after the students’ specials. I will also keep a timer next to me for me to glance at.
I. MODIFICATIONS FOR STUDENTS WITH SPECIAL NEEDS

For those students who need extra assistance due to a learning/social disability I will have one
of our classroom assistance to work with them. For those students who tend to get squirmy
during read-alouds I will let them doodle on their whiteboards as long as they are not distracting
their peers.
Lesson Implementation Reflection
I. How did your actual teaching of the lesson differ from your plans? Describe the changes and explain
why you made them.
My actual teaching differed from my plans in only a few ways. I forgot to use the audio recorder. Once I
realized I forgot to use it, I walked around to each student and asked him or her different questions to see
each student’s understanding about predictions.
I did not have the students draw each picture of Turkey’s disguise because after the first two disguises the
students began to catch on to the gist of the story.
II. Describe at least one way you could incorporate developmentally appropriate practice in a better or
more thorough way if you were to teach this lesson again.
If I were to teach this lesson again I would have gone more in depth with the lesson. I would have thought
of a new way to teach the lesson rather than using the whiteboards. Some of the students did not find the
whiteboards useful.
III. Based on the assessment data you collected, what would you do/teach next if you were the classroom
teacher?
Based off of my assessment data I will begin to introduce the language of making predictions and inferences.
I would choose a similar book that is great for making inferences, and before reading the book introduce
inferences.
IV. As a result of planning and teaching this lesson, what have you learned or had reinforced about
young children as learners?
Young children learn from being engaged. Many children are labeled as ADHD or ADD because they are
not engaged; those this may be the case for some students most students are not engaged because their
teachers do not make their lessons engaging. Children need to take ownership of their learning, thus
teachers need to empower their students in order to do so.
V. As a result of planning and teaching this lesson, what have you learned or had reinforced about
teaching?
Through teaching this lesson it has be reinforced that teaching should always be student centered.
Teachers should let students take ownership of their learning. A teacher is there to act as the guide and
facilitator while asking meaningful questions to help children to engage their minds. Unfortunately, the
students in my practicum classroom do not take ownership of their learning and are spoon-fed. They only
care about grades, and when I told them their assessment was not going to be graded, many students did
not do their best. Also, during the lesson many of the children had a hard time coming up with words on
their own. They were looking for the easiest and fastest way to finish the activity. It was very hard to
watch this take place.
VI. As a result of planning and teaching this lesson, what have you learned or had reinforced about
yourself?
From planning and teaching this lesson it has been reinforced that I am passionate about giving students
the freedom to take ownership of their learning.