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English lesson plan · 5th grade (Year 6 in England) · 60 minutes

Making inferences

Reading Comprehension

CCSS RL.5.1CCSS RI.5.1England: Y5/6 Reading (inference)England: KS2 SATs ReadingEngland: 11+ English

Objective and success criteria

Students will: Making inferences.

  • I can answer questions on today's skill on my own, without help.
  • I can explain each step and say why it works.
  • I can check my answer and spot a mistake.

Before and after

Needs first: Predicting and simple inference

Leads to: Citing textual evidence; Tone and mood; Implicit meaning and inference

Materials: A short text or extract (one copy each), Highlighters, Question cards, Mini whiteboards, A short model text on the board, Printed student sheet (below).

Warm-up · 6 min

  • Quick retrieval from earlier learning (Predicting and simple inference). Students answer on mini whiteboards.
  • Show answers together and note who needs support in the main task.
  1. The ice cream dripped down Lucy's arm. The sun beat down on the beach. What will probably happen to the ice cream? (It will melt. / It will freeze. / It will get colder. / It will grow.) → It will melt.Prompt: The answer is not written word for word. Look for clues.
  2. Jada looked at the dark clouds. She grabbed her umbrella before leaving. Why did Jada take her umbrella? (It was sunny. / She thought it would rain. / She was going swimming. / She lost her hat.) → She thought it would rain.Prompt: The answer is not written word for word. Look for clues.
  3. Kim stepped up to the high board. Her knees shook as she looked down at the water. How does Kim feel? (sleepy / bored / angry / nervous) → nervousPrompt: The answer is not written word for word. Look for clues.

Hook · 6 min

  • Read the first lines of a short text aloud and ask what students predict will happen and why.
  • Share the objective: Making inferences. Read the success criteria together.

I do: model it · 12 min

  • Work through the example out loud, saying why you do each step, not just what you do.
  • Example: The house was silent. Dust covered the furniture, and cobwebs hung from every corner. What can you infer about the house?
  • Step 1: An inference combines clues in the text with what you know.
  • Step 2: So the answer is: Nobody has lived there for a long time.
  • Answer: Nobody has lived there for a long time.
  • Pause after each step and ask a student to say what comes next.

We do: guided practice · 12 min

  • Do these together. Students try each step on whiteboards before you reveal it.
  • Use the hints as prompts rather than giving the answer.
  1. The house was silent. Dust covered the furniture, and cobwebs hung from every corner. What can you infer about the house? (It was cleaned this morning. / A party is happening. / Nobody has lived there for a long time. / It is brand new.) → Nobody has lived there for a long time.Prompt: The answer is not written word for word. Look for clues.
  2. Bea's eyes lit up when she unwrapped the paints. She had been asking for them since the summer. What can you infer? (Bea is disappointed. / Bea dislikes painting. / Bea bought the paints herself. / Bea is pleased with her present.) → Bea is pleased with her present.Prompt: The answer is not written word for word. Look for clues.

You do: independent practice · 17 min

  • Students work on the student sheet. Circulate and check the first two answers of every student early.
  • Students who finish: write a question of their own for a partner, with the answer.

The 8 questions are on the student sheet below, with answers in the key.

Exit ticket · 7 min

  • Two questions on their own. Sort answers into got it / nearly / not yet to plan the next lesson.
  1. The coach blew the whistle, and the players trudged off the field, heads down, while the other team cheered. What can you infer? (The players lost the match. / The players are going to start playing. / The players won. / The match was cancelled.) → The players lost the match.Prompt: The answer is not written word for word. Look for clues.

Watch out for

  • Answering from memory or opinion instead of evidence in the text.
  • Copying a long quote without explaining what it shows.

Support and stretch

Support

  • Review first: Predicting and simple inference.
  • Use concrete materials: a short text or extract (one copy each).
  • Give the first step of each question, or a partly worked example to finish.
  • Pair with a confident partner for the guided practice.

Stretch

  • Move on to: Citing textual evidence; Tone and mood; Implicit meaning and inference.
  • Explain a common mistake in writing and how to fix it.
  • Write a word problem that uses today's skill, then solve a partner's.

Homework and more practice

Free online practice with hints and printable worksheets for this skill: eurekami.com/english/grade-5.

Free lesson plan from eurekami.com/lesson-plan-builder

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Making inferences

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The Clever Octopus

If you wanted to design an intelligent animal from scratch, you probably would not start with a creature that has no bones, three hearts and blue blood. Yet the octopus is one of the most remarkable problem-solvers in the animal kingdom. In laboratories, octopuses have learned to unscrew jar lids to reach crabs inside. Some have escaped from their tanks at night, crept across the floor to a neighbouring tank to eat the fish, and then returned home before morning. In the wild, veined octopuses have been filmed collecting coconut shells, carrying them across the seabed and assembling them into a portable shelter – one of the few known examples of tool use by an invertebrate. What makes this intelligence so surprising is how different the octopus brain is from ours. About two-thirds of its roughly 500 million nerve cells are not in its head at all but in its eight arms. Each arm can taste, touch and even make simple decisions on its own. Scientists are still debating what it might feel like to be an animal whose thinking is spread throughout its body. The octopus's cleverness may be linked to its lifestyle. Without a shell for protection, it must outwit predators by hiding, changing colour in a fraction of a second, or squeezing through gaps no bigger than its beak. Survival depends on flexible thinking. Strangely, most octopuses live only one or two years. They have no parents to teach them and usually die soon after laying eggs. Every skill they show, they must largely work out for themselves.

  1. Question 1

    Read "The Clever Octopus". What does the final paragraph suggest about octopus intelligence?

    • A. Octopuses learn everything from their parents.
    • B. Octopuses are not really intelligent.
    • C. Octopuses live longer than most animals.
    • D. It is especially impressive because octopuses learn without being taught.

The Phone-Free Lunch Experiment

For one month, students at Brookfield School tried something unusual: no phones at lunch. Phones stayed in lockers from twelve until one, and the dining hall filled with board games, sketchbooks and a lot more noise. The idea came from the student council. In a survey, 61 per cent of students said they spent most of lunch looking at a screen, and many said they wanted a break but found it hard to stop on their own. At first, not everyone was happy. "I thought it was a punishment," admitted Jaden, 12. "But after a week I'd learned to play chess, and now I actually look forward to lunch." Teachers noticed changes too. Ms Ortega, who supervises the hall, said there were fewer arguments and more students sitting in mixed groups. However, some students said they missed messaging family members during the day. The council will now vote on whether to keep the rule. One suggestion is a compromise: phone-free Mondays to Thursdays, with Fridays left free.

  1. Question 2

    Read "The Phone-Free Lunch Experiment". Why might the council consider the 'compromise'?

    • A. because teachers asked for longer lunches
    • B. to keep the benefits while answering students who wanted to contact family
    • C. because nobody liked the rule
    • D. because phones were broken

Pepper's First Week: A Diary

Saturday. Today we collected Pepper from the rescue centre. She is a skinny brown dog with one floppy ear and one ear that stands straight up. In the car, she shook the whole way home, and I held her blanket so she could smell it. I felt nervous too. Sunday. Pepper hid behind the sofa all day. Mum says rescue dogs sometimes need time to trust people because they do not know what is going to happen next. I lay on the floor and read my comic out loud so she could get used to my voice. Tuesday. A breakthrough! When I got back from school, Pepper crept out and sniffed my shoes. Then she licked my hand. I stayed completely still, although I wanted to cheer. Thursday. We went to the park on her lead. A bicycle rang its bell, and Pepper jumped behind my legs. I knelt down and talked to her calmly until her tail started wagging again. Friday. Tonight Pepper fell asleep with her head on my foot. I didn't move for an hour, even though my foot went numb. I think she has decided she lives here now.

  1. Question 3

    Read "Pepper's First Week: A Diary". Why did Pepper jump behind the writer's legs in the park?

    • A. She saw another dog.
    • B. She wanted to play hide-and-seek.
    • C. The bicycle bell frightened her.
    • D. She was tired.

A Day at the Fire Station

Firefighters do much more than put out fires. At Station 9, the day begins at eight o'clock sharp with a check of every piece of equipment. The crew test the hoses, check the air tanks and make sure the ladders slide smoothly. "If something is broken, we need to know now, not when there's an emergency," says Captain Rivera. After the checks, the firefighters exercise for an hour. Their job is very physical. They must carry heavy hoses, climb ladders in thick protective suits and sometimes carry people to safety. In the afternoon, the crew often visit schools to teach children about fire safety. They show how to check smoke alarms and explain why you should never hide during a fire. "Get out, stay out, and call for help," Captain Rivera tells every class. When the alarm rings, everything changes. The crew pull on their gear, jump into the fire engine and are on their way in less than a minute. Calls might be for a house fire, a car accident or even a cat stuck up a tree. Whatever the emergency, the firefighters of Station 9 are ready.

  1. Question 4

    Read "A Day at the Fire Station". Why do the firefighters need to exercise?

    • A. Their job needs strength and fitness.
    • B. They are training for a race.
    • C. They have nothing else to do.
    • D. It is the rule at every job.

Message in a Bottle (a poem)

I am a bottle, empty and light, tossed from a boat on a bright summer night. No note inside me, no secret to tell, just plastic and air and a sea-salty smell. The ocean is patient, the ocean is wide; it rocks me and rolls me from tide to tide. A turtle swims near me and stares at my shine. I am not a jellyfish. Please, don't you dine! I'll drift for a lifetime, I'll drift for a few, I'll crumble to pieces too tiny for you. But somebody somewhere could carry me back, a hand on the beach and a bin in a sack. So here is my message, though no one wrote it: the sea keeps whatever we throw. Don't forget it.

  1. Question 5

    Read "Message in a Bottle (a poem)". Why does the bottle say, "I am not a jellyfish. Please, don't you dine!"?

    • A. The bottle wants to be eaten.
    • B. Turtles can mistake shiny plastic for jellyfish and eat it.
    • C. Turtles are afraid of bottles.
    • D. Jellyfish live inside bottles.

The Vault at the Top of the World

On a frozen island in the Arctic Ocean, between Norway and the North Pole, a narrow concrete doorway sticks out of the side of a mountain. Behind it, a tunnel leads deep into the rock. This is the Svalbard Global Seed Vault, and it holds more than a million packets of seeds from almost every country on Earth. Why keep seeds in a mountain? Farmers all over the world depend on many different varieties of crops, such as types of rice that survive floods or kinds of wheat that resist disease. If a variety disappears because of war, natural disaster or simple accident, it may be lost for ever. The vault is a back-up copy, like saving a precious file in two places. The location was chosen with care. The vault is high enough above sea level to stay dry even if ice caps melt. Inside, the seeds are kept at about minus 18 degrees Celsius, cold enough to keep many of them alive for decades or even centuries. The surrounding rock is permanently frozen, so even if the power failed, the seeds would stay cold. The vault opened in 2008. In 2015, it was used for the first time: scientists who had lost access to their own seed bank during a war in Syria withdrew samples, grew new plants and later sent fresh seeds back to the vault. The back-up had worked. No one hopes the vault will be needed often. But like a fire extinguisher in a school corridor, it is reassuring to know it is there.

  1. Question 6

    Read "The Vault at the Top of the World". Why does the writer compare the vault to a fire extinguisher?

    • A. Both are red and heavy.
    • B. Both are used every day.
    • C. Both are kept ready for an emergency, and we hope not to need them often.
    • D. Both are found in schools.

Lady Montagu and the Smallpox Gamble

In the early eighteenth century, smallpox was one of the most feared diseases in Europe. It killed around three in every ten people it infected and left many survivors scarred or blind. Lady Mary Wortley Montagu knew its cruelty personally: the disease had killed her brother and marked her own face. In 1717, while living in Constantinople (now Istanbul), where her husband was the British ambassador, she observed a remarkable practice. Local women would take a small amount of material from a mild smallpox sore and scratch it into the skin of a healthy person. The person usually developed a mild illness and was then protected for life. This process was called variolation. Montagu was so impressed that she had her young son variolated. When she returned to England, she campaigned to spread the practice, despite fierce opposition. Some doctors resented being taught by a woman; others distrusted a practice from abroad. To win public confidence, Montagu had her daughter variolated in front of physicians from the royal court. Variolation was not without risk: a small number of patients developed severe smallpox, and they could infect others. Decades later, in 1796, Edward Jenner developed a safer method using cowpox, a related but much milder disease. His method, called vaccination after the Latin word for cow, gradually replaced variolation. Smallpox was declared eradicated worldwide in 1980. Jenner is often called the father of vaccination, but the story began with the courage of a woman who noticed what others had overlooked.

  1. Question 7

    Read "Lady Montagu and the Smallpox Gamble". Why did Montagu have her daughter variolated in front of royal physicians?

    • A. because her daughter was ill
    • B. because the law required it
    • C. to prove the method was safe and gain trust
    • D. to test Jenner's vaccine

The Kite Festival

Amara had spent three weeks building her kite. She had bent the bamboo sticks, stretched the paper tight and painted a fierce golden dragon across the front. It was going to win the prize for best design at the town's kite festival. She was sure of it. On the morning of the festival, the field was crowded with families. Kites shaped like fish, birds and boats bobbed in the breeze. Amara's little brother, Kofi, trailed behind her, clutching a small diamond kite he had made from a plastic bag and two straws. "Mine's not very good," Kofi mumbled. Amara ran, and her dragon rose beautifully – until a sudden gust snapped one of the bamboo sticks. The kite twisted, spun and crashed into the grass. The paper ripped right through the dragon's face. Amara's eyes stung. Three weeks of work, ruined in three seconds. Kofi tugged her sleeve. "You can fly mine with me," he offered. At first Amara shook her head. Then she looked at Kofi's hopeful face and took the string. Together they ran, and the little plastic kite shot up higher than any other kite in the sky. People pointed and cheered. That afternoon, the judges gave Kofi a ribbon for "Highest Flyer". Amara clapped louder than anyone. She realised she was smiling more than she would have if she had won the prize herself.

  1. Question 8

    Read "The Kite Festival". Why did Amara's eyes sting?

    • A. She was close to crying.
    • B. The sun was too bright.
    • C. She had paint in them.
    • D. The wind was full of dust.

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Answer key: Making inferences

  1. 1. D. It is especially impressive because octopuses learn without being taught.

  2. 2. B. to keep the benefits while answering students who wanted to contact family

  3. 3. C. The bicycle bell frightened her.

  4. 4. A. Their job needs strength and fitness.

  5. 5. B. Turtles can mistake shiny plastic for jellyfish and eat it.

  6. 6. C. Both are kept ready for an emergency, and we hope not to need them often.

  7. 7. C. to prove the method was safe and gain trust

  8. 8. A. She was close to crying.