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Have you ever been asked to read between the lines when answering a comprehension question?
When we read between the lines, we are using our inference skills.
Inference is where we use clues and evidence from a story to help us answer a question.
Read the passage below.
Milo looked at the calendar and his face lit up. Quickly, he grabbed his bag and skipped out of the house.
How is Milo feeling?
The answer to this question isn’t written in words but we can infer it from clues in the passage.
The clues in this passage were his face lit up and skipped out of the house.
When our faces light up, we are happy or excited about something.
We also skip when we’re happy.
We can infer that Milo is happy and looking forward to whatever he read on his calendar - what might that be, do you think?
In this activity, we will infer character’s feelings from the story below. We must make sure that we have our detective thinking cap on and give the story a careful read before we move onto the questions.
Goat on the loose!
After devouring her delicious breakfast, Ivy excitedly put on her wellies and puddle suit. She wanted to be ready to leave when her dad arrived. He hadn’t treated her to a trip to Daisy’s Farm for over a year now and she couldn’t wait to return. As she hurriedly grabbed her backpack, she wondered whether they would have any piglets this year. They made the sweetest little squeaking noises when she saw them last time.
The ding-dong of the doorbell echoed around the house as Ivy leapt towards the front door. "Don’t answer the door until you’ve checked you know who’s behind it!" Ivy’s mum ordered from the kitchen.
"Dad’s here, dad’s here!" She repeated enthusiastically whilst bouncing on the spot.
"You can open the door then," her stepdad said. Ivy had already opened the door and hugged her dad before her stepdad could even finish his sentence.
Looking out of the car window at the grassy, green fields of Yorkshire, Ivy thought about all the animals she was going to see. Her dad had nursery rhymes blasting in the car and he made funny animal noises while he drove. He always knew how to make Ivy laugh.
When they got to the farm, they paid for their tickets and put their wristbands on. “Let’s buy some animal feed and go to see the goats,” Ivy’s dad suggested. They walked on a grassy path between the sheep pen and the Golden Guernsey goats. The goats’ fur was as golden as the sun and they had large, curious eyes.
Holding her hand steady to feed one of the Golden Guernsey goats, Ivy giggled as the goat’s bumpy tongue licked the food off her hand. It really tickled! Another jealous golden goat came running towards the fence as he really wanted Ivy’s farm food. He was so hungry he used his front hooves to climb half way up the fence to get as close to her as possible.
Suddenly, Matt and Ivy could hear the sound of a tractor’s engine behind them. It was farmer Daisy doing her rounds and checking up on all the animals. When she looked inside the Golden Guernsey goat pen, she saw that two mischievous pygmy goats from the pen next door had managed to sneak in. Farmer Daisy opened the gate to the Golden Guernseys' pen and went in to try and catch the pygmy goats.
The pygmy goats moved rapidly and kept sprinting away from farmer Daisy. Every time she got close, they ran in opposite directions to fool her. As she turned around, she saw that one of the goats had managed to get back into its own pen. There must be a hole in this fence somewhere, she thought. Farmer Daisy decided that running after the goats wasn’t working and she needed to sneak up behind them.
"Look dad!" Ivy suddenly shouted, pointing at the gate farmer Daisy had left open, "That golden goat is about to escape!"
Ivy’s dad was about to shout and tell farmer Daisy but it was too late. The goat was on its way out!
Looks like it was Ivy and Matt to the rescue!
