Provide students with the entire scenario instead of having them draw the scenario as it is revealed.For students who have writing deficits, an oral or video presentation would work nicely.Have students create their own scenarios and have them trade papers with classmates to see if they can determine the artist’s intent.These healthy debates are perfect for the science classroom because they get students feeling comfortable voicing their opinions early on, encouraging them to think outside the box during future discussions. You can also open the assignment up for debate – if your students are passionate about their observations, the debates become very heated with students adamant about what they observe and what they infer about the scenario.Did the person making each statement observe or infer what he or she. We always loved this assignment because it was their first homework assignment of the year and the choice of assignment allowed us to gain some insight into our students’ learning styles. Directions: Read each statement and decide whether it is an observation or an inference. If you chose an excerpt to read from, have students come up with a few alternate ending based on their observations.
For the final part of their assignment, provide students with an option of creating a story about their site, either by creating a comic or writing a story.Remind them to cite evidence of their reasoning and that, while their thoughts and words are what we want them to record, options such as “I don’t know” or “because I think it is” are not acceptable answers. We sum it all up by comparing the definition of observation to that of an inference. That discussion then leads into the meaning of an observation and takes us into a conversation about the five senses and how they help us to gather information about our surroundings.
That opens up discussion about how “seeing” the paper constitutes an observation while “guessing” or “inferring” papers are in there without actually seeing them is an inference. Most say “PAPER!” Can they see the paper though? Not with the drawers closed! We then open the drawer to reveal to them that we do, in fact, keep our papers and files in there. Observation is more of recording or remarking an event or phenomena, whereas an inference is what you make of that observation or what conclusion you draw from.