Making Inferences using "My Lucky Day"

Making inferences is an important skill that learners need to have as they comprehend text. Making inferences takes comprehension to a deeper level than just the surface.

Find more comprehension strategies paired with picture books in our Comprehension Reading Strategies series.

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Why Making Inferences Can be Tricky

Now, making inferences can be tricky for some learners.

Here’s why: It requires that learners dig deeper, beyond just the words of the text to draw conclusions about character’s feelings, thoughts, or other concepts.

For example, the text might say: “We get to go to the zoo again! I can’t wait to see the tigers!”

I could ask the learner questions like: “Has this person ever been to the zoo?” or “How do you think this person feels about going to the zoo?”

These two questions require learners to infer or read between the lines because the text doesn’t exactly answer those questions word for word. Often, when asked questions that require thinking deeper, we are met with blank stares and the answer, “I don’t know because it doesn’t say.”

See how it can be a little tricky?

Making Inferences with “My Lucky Day”

Today, I’d like to explore inferring with one of my favorite picture books of all time, My Lucky Day by Keiko Kasza. Now, inferring happens when learners take what they know {their prior knowledge} and combine it with what the text and/or picture imply.

If you’re looking for more books that can help with this comprehension strategy, you’ll want to visit my book list for making inferences and predictions!

First, you’ll want to have learners take the printable page {download found at the END of this post} and fold it up so only the first picture shows, like you see in the image above.

As you read the book, stop reading the book in the spots that match the pictures on the printable page. For each section, you’re going to ask something like: “What do you think is happening in this picture/part of the story?” or “How does the character feel now?”

Learners can write their answer or draw their answer in each section. If you’re working one-on-one or with a very a small group of learners who might not be able to write their answer, you could do some of the writing. I used this with my Kindergartner, so we shared the writing. {We used her Kindergarten Spelling Folder for this, too.}

A great follow-up question after is “WHY do you think that?” Encourage learners to think about their own knowledge and the text/pictures from the book to support their inference. We did this through the entire book at each stopping place.