Sometimes I think that my local weathermen would have more accurate predictions if they said something like “It’s cloudy and later we have a chance of meatballs” because quite frankly that is more likely what is going to happen than what they predict most days. In their defense, I do live on the far side of the great Cincinnati cereal bowl that does super strange things to all weather systems but let’s face it no matter the excuse constantly butchered predictions are frustrating. Why? Because there is no way to prepare. Do I take an umbrella? Do I need a jacket? How many seasons will I experience today? I told you all I live in Cincinnati, we can absolutely experience weather from all four seasons in one day. While predictions aren’t always (or maybe ever) 100% accurate, we use them to help us prepare. Which brings me around to what I actually want to talk to you about today – making helpful predictions as a thoughtful reader.
Predictions while reading help our brains to prepare for what they might encounter. in other words, predictions help us to open our schema files a bit earlier and allow us to be ready for words and concepts we might encounter as we read. Will all our predictions be accurate? No way! But as we learn from the track record of the weathermen, we can still keep our jobs despite being wrong regularly. The important piece is that we keep taking in information and making new predictions as we learn more in life and from the text.
Keeping with the weatherman comparison for a minute longer, though it may seem as though the weatherman is taking a complete wild guess about the day’s weather that is inaccurate. Meteorologists as they are more appropriately called, spend a substantial amount of time tracking weather patterns, interpreting scientific data about pressure changes and looking into the moisture and winds within a system. There is an incredible amount of work and information that goes into the prediction that they make. The same should be true for predictions we make as thoughtful readers. We should not be shooting from the hip or making wild predictions – that is all quite unhelpful. While we may not be right all of the time, making logical predictions is far more helpful as it helps us to open the correct schema files giving us a leg up as we continue to process the story before us. Could we still be wrong even after making a logical thoughtful prediction? Of course and sometimes that is the most fun because the author surprised us by taking the story in a direction we didn’t see coming – just like some weather patterns just don’t behave as they “should” and we end up with eight inches of snow instead of rain – bring on the sledding and snowmen!
Last I checked books don’t have data points, models and historical charts to plow through as you prepare to make a prediction. Rather predictions come from pieces of information like the title, text and pictures. You can also include pieces of information from your schema. For example, this morning we were reading Horton Hears a Who by Dr. Seuss and one of the boys made a prediction that Horton would go searching for the right clover in the field of clover because the Whos were his friends and friends help one another. While there was some text that pointed to the fact that Horton would do whatever he could to help the Whos, most of this prediction came from their schema about friendship. Conversely, at another point in the story a different boy predicted that the kangaroo would make problems for Horton through the whole book. This prediction could only have come from the text and pictures as I don’t believe any of my boys would have “kangaroos always cause problems” in their schema file.
Stow those wild guesses and bring out the helpful predictions. These readers are on their way to being smart thoughtful readers. By teaching your brain to make predictions out of the words and pictures of a text as well as your schema, you are training it to be prepared for what may lie ahead, you are giving yourself a leg up. There are many other steps you can take as you work together to become thoughtful readers who predict as they are reading but to get those you’ll need to check back to the blog and join us on the socials – Facebook, Instagram and Threads – even better, join our email list as subscribers always get exclusive content to just how to raise and be a thoughtful reader.
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