Inference (Teaching Students to Develop Hypotheses, Evaluate Evidence, and Draw Logical Conclusion)

Designed in partnership with more than 75 schools, Strategic Teacher PLC Guides make the important work of bringing high-impact, research-based instructional practices into every classroom easier than ever before. Each guide serves as a complete professional development resource for a team of teachers (or professional learning community) to learn, plan, and implement the strategy in their classrooms.

This guide focuses on inference, or the ability to examine information, generate hypotheses, and draw conclusions that are not explicitly stated. Making inferences is a crucial foundational process that underlies higher-order thinking and 21st century skills.

The guide walks readers through four research-based, classroom-tested strategies that help develop students' inferential thinking skills:
* Inductive Learning helps students draw inferences by grouping data, labeling the data groups with descriptive titles, and using the groups to generate and test hypotheses.
* Mystery presents students with a puzzling question or situation and has students examine clues that help them explain the mystery.
* Main Idea teaches students how to use inferential thinking to construct main ideas that are not explicitly stated.
* Investigation directs students to use various problem-solving approaches that require inference.

This PLC Guide takes you and your colleagues on a "guided tour" of inference, enabling you to
* Consider which of the four major inference strategies would best work in your classroom.
* Look for opportunities to incorporate inference-based activities into your instruction.
* Learn from sample inference lessons and planning forms designed by other teachers.
* Design an inference lesson for your own classroom.
* Examine student work at various levels of proficiency and use your findings to improve instructional decision making.