Mentor Texts {Drawing Inferences}

When I see or hear the term "drawing inferences", I always think of a little boy in my very first class. One of the test questions on a pre-made test said "drawing inferences" and then asked the question. He thought he was supposed to draw his answer!

I can understand the confusion. Drawing inferences, making inferences, inferring, etc...

http://talkingtalk.co.za/reading-comprehension/reading-comprehension2-3/
Link in picture!

Thankfully, I have a lot of books to use for this strategy.


Fly Away Home by Eve Bunting 

Summary from Amazon: A homeless boy who lives in an airport with his father, moving from terminal to terminal trying not to be noticed, is given hope when a trapped bird finally finds its freedom.
How Many Days to America? by Eve Bunting

Summary from Amazon: After the police come, a family is forced to flee their Caribbean island and set sail for America in a small fishing boat.

*I've used this book before to correlate to Social Studies standards.



Teammates by Peter Golenbock

Summary from Amazon: This is the moving story of how Jackie Robinson became the first black player on a Major League baseball team when he joined the Brooklyn Dodgers in the 1940s, and how on a fateful day in Cincinnati, Pee Wee Reese took a stand and declared Jackie his teammate.



Babushka's Doll by Patricia Polacco

Summary from Amazon: Natasha isn't really a bad girl. It's just that she wants to play on the swing now, not after the wash has been hung up to dry. And she wants her soup now, not after the goats have been fed. Looking after Natasha keeps Babushka, Natasha's grandmother, very busy. Then, after lunch, Natasha notices a doll sitting on Babushka's shelf...a doll Babushka tells Natasha she played with just once when she was a little girl. When Natasha plays with the doll while Babushka goes to the store for groceries, she discovers why once is enough with Babushka's doll...and finds out just how tiring it can be to take care of a child who wants everything now.



Train to Somewhere by Eve Bunting

Summary from Amazon: Marianne, heading west with fourteen other children on an Orphan Train, is sure her mother will show up at one of the stations along the way. When her mother left Marianne at the orphanage, hadn't she promised she'd come for her after making a new life in the West? Stop after stop goes by, and there's no sign of her mother in the crowds that come to look over the children. No one shows any interest in adopting shy, plain Marianne, either. But that's all right: She has to be free for her mother to claim her. Then the train pulls into its final stop, a town called Somewhere . . .
*I've used this book before to correlate to Social Studies standards.
The Circus Ship by Chris Van Dusen

Summary from Amazon: When a circus ship runs aground off the coast of Maine, the poor animals are left on their own to swim the chilly waters. Staggering onto a nearby island, they soon win over the wary townspeople with their kind, courageous ways. So well do the critters blend in that when the greedy circus owner returns to claim them, villagers of all species conspire to outsmart the bloated blowhard. With buoyant rhymes and brilliantly caricatured illustrations evoking the early nineteenth century, Chris Van Dusen presents a hugely entertaining tale about the bonds of community — and a rare hidden-pictures spread for eagle-eyed readers of all ages.

*We have this book for our son and he LOVES it! I actually have an entire blog post about it HERE.



The Other Side by Jacqueline Woodson

Summary from Amazon: Clover's mom says it isn't safe to cross the fence that segregates their African-American side of town from the white side where Anna lives. But the two girls strike up a friendship, and get around the grown-ups' rules by sitting on top of the fence together.



The Memory String by Eve Bunting


Summary from Amazon: Each button on Laura’s memory string represents a piece of her family history. The buttons Laura cherishes the most belonged to her mother—a button from her prom dress, a white one off her wedding dress, and a single small button from the nightgown she was wearing on the day she died. When the string breaks, Laura’s new stepmother, Jane, is there to comfort Laura and search for a missing button, just as Laura’s mother would have done. But it’s not the same—Jane isn’t Mom. In Eve Bunting’s moving story, beautifully illustrated by Ted Rand, Laura discovers that a memory string is not just for remembering the past: it’s also for recording new memories.




I'm sure there are tons of other great books to teach students to make inferences, but I have a great start!


What books do you use?

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