Reading Strategy: Make Inferences

When you make an inference, you figure something out based on information and experience. Suppose a friend tells you he will come over at five o’clock. You may infer that he means five o’clock in the evening, not in the morning. You make inferences like this when you read, too.

Reading Strategy Make Inferences
    How to Make Inferences

  • 1. Look for ideas and information that the author emphasizes.

  • 2. Think about what your own experience tells you.

  • 3. Combine what you know with what you read, and figure out what the author means but hasn’t said directly.

Strategy in Action

Here’s how one student made inferences.

Look Into the Text

“Akhsotha,” the girl said. “My grandmother, we must go into the lodge before it is dark. I’m afraid of the night.”

Grandmother shook her head. “Iah, if we go in too soon, we will not see Sky Bear.” Grandmother looked up into the sky. The pattern of stars that shaped the Great Bear was bright. “Soon she will roam around the skyland.”

What I read:
The girl wants to go inside. She is afraid of the dark.

“I know many young children who are afraid of the dark. So I think the girl is young.”

Practice Together

Read this passage about Sky Bear again, and make an inference of your own. Follow the steps in the How-To box. Use sticky notes to keep track of ideas and information in the text.