Getting the Picture: Inference and Narrative Skills for Young People with Communication Difficulties

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Getting the Picture

of related interest

Assessing and Developing Communication and Thinking Skills in People with Autism and Communication Difficulties A Toolkit for Parents and Professionals Kate Silver With Autism Initiatives

ISBN 978 1 84310 352 3

Promoting Social Interaction for Individuals with Communicative Impairments Making Contact Edited by M. Suzanne Zeedyk

ISBN 978 1 84310 539 8

Social Skills for Teenagers and Adults with Asperger Syndrome A Practical Guide to Day-to-Day Life Nancy J. Patrick

ISBN 978 1 84310 876 4

Social Enjoyment Groups for Children, Teens and Young Adults with Autism Spectrum Disorders Guiding Toward Growth John Merges

ISBN 978 1 84905 834 6

I l l u s t r at e d by O l i v e r A l l c hin

David Nash

Getting the Picture Inference and Narrative Skills for Young People with Communication Difficulties

Jessica Kingsley Publishers London and Philadelphia

First published in 2011 by Jessica Kingsley Publishers 116 Pentonville Road London N1 9JB, UK and 400 Market Street, Suite 400 Philadelphia, PA 19106, USA

www.jkp.com

Copyright © David Nash 2011 Illustrations copyright © Oliver Allchin 2011

All pages may be photocopied for personal use with this programme, but may not be reproduced for any other purposes without the permission of the publisher. Warning: The doing of an unauthorised act in relation to a copyright work may result in both a civil claim for damages and criminal prosecution. Library of Congress Cataloging in Publication Data A CIP catalog record for this book is available from the Library of Congress British Library Cataloguing in Publication Data A CIP catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library

ISBN 978 1 84905 127 9 ISBN pdf eBook 978 0 85700 315 7

To Thomas and Ioan

Acknowledgements

David Nash would like to thank Tess Mullins and Gaynor Wall for their work in the early development of this book, and Hannah Williams and Gemma Green for their support and guidance. This book would not be possible without the students who have helped to develop the worksheets by pointing out my mistakes. Oliver would like to thank Becky for her patience, and Mum and Dad.

Cont ents

Introduction 9 Chapter 1 Inference from a Single Picture

17

Chapter 2 Inference from a Picture Sequence

43

Chapter 3 Inference and Narrative: The Big Picture

69

Chapter 4 Sequencing Skills

95

References 109

Introduction

Inference Inference is an important skill in our daily communication and is often taken for granted. To comprehend almost any situation we must infer meaning to make sense of what is happening around us. To infer is to predict, to make a hypothesis, to guess. We comprehend when we assimilate two sources of information: 1. The information we receive through our senses (seeing, hearing, tasting, smelling and touching). 2. The information stored in our long-term memory.

9

10â•…â•… Getting the Picture

To make an inference, the information we receive must be integrated with information already stored in our long-term memory. It is therefore apparent that experiences of the world and events play an important role in our ability to make effective inferences. We use inference to make sense of the conversations we have, the books we read, the television programmes we watch and the behaviour we see. We make guesses about people’s intentions and feelings as we can be certain of very few of the thought processes and desires of others. Inference allows us to fill in the gaps to the best of our abilities, and we do it often without thinking. Indeed, our inferential ability is noticed most greatly when we fail to use it. The two main forms of inference are bridging inferences and elaborative inferences (Eysenck and Keane 1995, p.306). Bridging inferences are made to add cohesion to discourse and written text; for example, pronouns refer to a person who has been mentioned previously. Elaborative inferences serve to embellish, to add substance and further meaning to what has been said or written. This book is designed to work on elaborative inferences – the ability to look at the information given and think beyond it. Examples may include: •

Where might someone be going?

•

Why might they be going there?

•

How might they be feeling?

•

What might they do next?

Elaborative inferences draw on our knowledge of the world and allow us to make predictions about what might happen. These skills are important for reading, but are equally important for verbal communication. Inferential skills have been widely heralded as essential for comprehension (Department for Children, Schools and Families 2008), and this book is designed to support students to work on skills for effective comprehension in both written and verbal modalities. The ability to draw inferences plays a huge part in any comprehension task, whether reading text or listening to someone talk. However, it is not only verbal information that informs our decision-making processes when we talk to people; our visual inferential skills can also shape

Introductionâ•…â•…11

conversations; for example, asking a friend where they are going when they are dressed more smartly than usual. We constantly wonder about the feelings, thoughts and intentions of others so that we may communicate with them more effectively. We also attempt to predict how others may feel, what they may think and how they might behave as a consequence of our actions. It is easy to see how the inability to infer from the information we are presented with may cause problems with any communicative task. So far there has been limited research into the inferential skills of people with speech, language and communication needs (SLCN), especially adolescents. A study by Botting and Adams (2005) found that children with communication difficulties performed significantly more poorly than age-matched peers when their inferential skills were tested in a written comprehension task. For a full review of current literature on the efficacy of inference work see the Department for Children, Schools and Families 2008 report, Effective Teaching of Inference Skills for Reading.

Narrative To narrate is to tell a story, to explain episodically what has happened with enough detail to allow the listener to comprehend fully what you mean to convey. Storytelling is not just a skill we learn to use in lessons at school, but something we do every day when recounting events to others. Narrative skills play an essential part in the writing of text, but are also beneficial when building conversation. The ability to properly structure what we say to others when recounting an event is necessary not only so that the listener can understand the sequence of events, but also so that they can be given an insight into how the event has affected us emotionally and behaviourally. Evidence suggests that adolescents with specific language impairment (SLI) perform more poorly than peers on two types of narrative task: storytelling from pictures and storytelling within conversation (Wetherell, Botting and Conti-Ramsden 2007). Joffe reports that narrative training for students with language impairment can help to improve a range of language skills (Joffe, Cruice and Chiat 2008, p.77).


This book includes worksheets which follow a simple narrative structure that students can learn and use in their own conversations, as well as in written tasks. The worksheets focus solely on narrative structure and do not aim to develop other abilities considered important for effective narrative (e.g. length of utterance, syntax, semantics, etc.). This book has been designed to work alongside other tools that teach effective narrative skills to students.

The development of this book The inspiration for this book came from working with students with SLCN who were struggling to draw reasonable inferences from both written and spoken input. The students were given tasks involving inference in written and verbal form, and many struggled to learn new inferential skills. I wondered whether the students might benefit from working on their visual inference skills and then developing these same skills for written and verbal tasks. After an extensive search for purely visual resources that work on inference, without success, I decided to develop worksheets that focus on inference without relying heavily on language. The narrative and sequencing worksheets were developed alongside the inference tasks to allow students to develop effective storytelling skills while recognising the importance that inference plays in narrative. All of the worksheets in this book have been used successfully by speech and language therapists and tutors working with students in specialist education, in both individual and group sessions. The use of visual material is in no way intended to replace interventions based on auditory or written information. This book is intended to supplement or provide an entry into the students’ development of inference skills, to show students that inference is not only something that happens when they read but an important aspect of daily life.

Guidance for using this book When introducing the concept of inference, it is always best to simplify! One way I have discovered to explain inference is: ‘making a good guess after looking at all of the information


you have’. Other students prefer the idea of looking for clues and solving puzzles. Some students require modelling to grasp the concept; it is best to give them one ridiculous inference (the funnier the better) and one that is plausible. I always like to explain exactly why it is important to study inference; it helps us to understand just about everything, from what is happening in television programmes to how to understand our friends more effectively. Some students struggle with the concept that some inferences are more plausible than others, or some ‘guesses’ are better than others. While it is important to emphasise that most answers could be true, some answers are more likely than others. An example I was once given is related to the worksheet depicting an old lady receiving a letter (pp.46–7): the student inferred that the letter was from a university. The student was adamant that his hypothesis about who may have sent the lady the letter was equally as plausible as any of my suggestions, for example a friend or a relative. The student was then asked to write down a list of ten people or institutions that may have sent her a letter and then rank the items on the list 1–10, with 1 being ‘most likely’ and 10 being ‘very unlikely’. The student was able to decide which ideas had more credibility and then decided his answer was not, after all, the ‘best’ guess he could have made about who had sent the letter. It may benefit some students to learn to make as many inferences as possible and then filter out the less plausible. There is evidence to suggest that students with superior comprehension skills make more inferences when reading than students with less comprehension ability (Cain and Oakhill 2001). It is not thought that all students should work through the sheets in order; some students may not be motivated by some of the easier worksheets (located at the beginning of Chapters 1, 2 and 4). These sheets may, however, be used when modelling the processes we use to infer effectively when looking at the pictures.

Chapters 1 and 2: Inference The first two chapters in the book are concerned solely with inference. Chapter 1 has single pictures with questions relating to them. The pictures are arranged in order of difficulty, with more visual evidence being given in the earlier pictures. The last four pictures in the chapter deal with interactions between people – this requires the student to begin to infer how people and their emotional states and intentions may interact.


The questions are designed so that the more specific questions are first, and the questions relating to more abstract concepts (e.g. prediction of future events) are at the end of the worksheets. When using the worksheets some students will give full answers and some won’t. For students who need to give more information, or whose answers do not initially seem to make sense, it is best to ask ‘Why do you think that?’ This way you will begin to understand their thought processes and can plan your intervention around the difficulties you observe. There are essentially two ways to use the worksheets: 1. Photocopy the worksheets with the questions and ask the students to fill them in. 2. Show the students the picture/picture sequence and fill in the worksheet as the students answer the questions. If the sheets are being used in group work, they have been found to work best when the students access the pictures without the questions and then mind map their ideas onto sheets of paper as the questions are asked.

Chapter 3: Narrative Chapter 3 is aimed at working on narrative skills while continuing to ask the student to make inferences. Chapters 1 and 2 introduce the concept of inference and prediction; Chapter 3 extends this to narrative. There are five pictures in this chapter, each featuring multiple characters. The questions that follow each picture are split into two sections: the first section looks at the scene, while the second section is concerned with the people and how they interact with each other and their surroundings. Once they’ve answered the questions the students are encouraged to select one character and write or speak a short narrative about them. There are two versions of the narrative sheet: Narrative Sheet A breaks up the task and asks the students to write out their narrative as they answer each question in turn; Narrative Sheet B can be used when the students are more comfortable with the structure of the worksheets and do not require as much guidance.


Chapter 4: Sequencing There are 12 sequences in Chapter 4, and each sequence has four pictures which tell a simple story. This chapter requires the students to look at each picture sequence and do the following: 1. Place the four pictures in the correct order. 2. Talk briefly about each of the four pictures in turn to give an overview of what is happening. Each page should be photocopied prior to use with a student, and the pictures cut out individually. The pictures should then be placed in a random order in front of the student. Tell the student that the pictures depict a short story that is out of sequence, and ask them to arrange the pictures into a sequence that makes most sense. Once the student has placed the pictures into the order they believe is correct, ask them to explain what is happening in each picture in turn to construct a short story. Alternatively, the sequences can be used purely as a narrative task. Place the four pictures in front of the students in the correct order and ask them to talk about each picture in turn to explain what is happening in the story. This is sometimes useful for students who have found the narrative task in Chapter 3 too demanding; this task can act as an intermediate activity as the student has more visual information on which to build their narrative. This chapter works not only on the student’s ability to sequence the pictures correctly, but also on their ability to sequence a short discourse task.

Chapter 1

Inference from a Single Picture


1.1

Copyright © David Nash and Oliver Allchin

Inference from a Single Pictureâ•…â•… 19

What do you think this man’s job is?

1.1 What time of day do you think it is?

What do you think he has just been doing?

What might he do next?



1.2



What time of year do you think this is?

1.2 How do you think this man is feeling?

Where do you think he is going?

What do you think he might do when he gets there?



1.3



What time of day do you think it is?

1.3 Where do you think this lady might have been?

How do you think she is feeling?

Where do you think she might go next?

What might happen when she gets there?



1.4



What do you think the weather is like?

1.4 Where do you think this young man is?

How do you think he is feeling?

Where do you think he might go next?

What might he do there?



1.5



Where do you think this lady is?

1.5 What do you think she has been painting?

Why do you think she has stopped?

What do you think she is thinking about?

What might she do now?



1.6



Where do you think this woman might be?

1.6 What time of day do you think it is?

How do you think she is feeling?

Who do you think she might be talking to?

What might happen next?



1.7



What do you think this man’s job is?

1.7 Do you think he has been busy?

Do you think he enjoys his job?

What might happen in the next 20 minutes?

What do you think he might do about his job in the future?



1.8




1.8 How do you think this lady is feeling?

What might have happened to make her feel like that?

What do you think she will do now?



1.9



Where do you think these men might be?

1.9 What might be in the box?

Why might they be moving it?

What do you think will happen next?



1.10



Where do you think these women are?

1.10 Who do you think the woman on the phone is talking to?

How do you think the lady with the book is feeling?

What do you think might happen next?



1.11



How do you think these young men know each other?

1.11 How do you think they are feeling?

What might they be talking about?

Where do you think they are going?

What might happen on their way there?



1.12



How do you think these two people know each other?

1.12 The man has a bunch of flowers. Why might this be?

Why do you think he is holding the flowers behind his back?

What do you think the woman might say to him?



Chapter 2

Inference from a Picture Sequence


2.1


Inference from a Picture Sequenceâ•…â•… 45

What time of year do you think it is?

2.1 What type of transport do you think this lady travels by?

Who do you think she meets at the end of her journey?

Why do you think she has gone to visit her?

How long do you think she will stay?



2.2




2.2 At the start of the story, do you think the lady was busy?

Who do you think wrote the letter?

What might the letter say?

How do you think the lady feels at the end?

What might she do next?



2.3




2.3 How far do you think the couple in the first picture have to travel?

How might these two couples know each other?

Why do you think they are celebrating?

Why do you think only three people are drinking wine?




2.4




2.4 What might this man be doing at the start of the story?

Who do you think he is talking to on the phone in the third picture?

What might he be saying?

How do you think he feels at the end of the story?

What do you think he will do next?



2.5



Where do you think these young men are waiting?

2.5 What might the man with the book be saying to the other two men?

How do the other two men react?

How do you think the man with the book feels at the end of the story?




2.6



What do you think is wrong with the trousers in this sequence?

2.6 How do you think the man feels when he gets home and looks at his new trousers?

What do you think the man says to the shop assistant when he returns the trousers?

What might the shop assistant be saying to the man?

What could happen next?



2.7



Where do you think this man might work?

2.7 At the beginning of the story, do you think he is busy?

Who do you think he is talking to on the phone?

In the last picture there is another man. Who do you think he is?

What do you think the men will talk about?



2.8




2.8 Who do you think the visitor is?

How do you think the couple feel about his arrival?

What do you think the lady is saying to the man in the last picture?

What could happen next?



2.9



What time of year do you think it might be?

2.9 Do you think the young man was expecting the letter?

Who do you think the letter is from?

What might it say?

Who do you think he is with at the end?

What do you think they are doing?



2.10




2.10 Where do you think the man is going at the start of the story?

When he returns, what has happened to his bike?

How do you think he feels?

Who do you think he is calling on his mobile phone?

Why do you think he should act quickly?




2.11



At the start of the story, where do you think the man is going?

2.11 In the second picture, why is he holding his head?

Why do you think he then looks up at the house?

Why does the man get the ladder?




2.12



At the start of the story, what do you think the young man is saying?

2.12 What might the older man think about what the younger man is saying?

Why does the camera get broken?

Who do you think is to blame for the broken camera?

What do you think the older man might say to the younger man when they next meet?

What do you think the younger man should do?


Chapter 3

Inference and Narrative: The Big Picture


3.1


Inference and Narrative: The Big Picture â•…â•… 71

The scene

3.1

1. What are these people doing?

2. How long do you think they have been waiting?

3. What time of day do you think it is?

4. What time of year do you think it is?



The people

3.1

1. What are the two young boys doing?


2. Where might the older lady be going?

3. One person in the picture has headphones on. How do you think they are feeling?

4. Someone in the picture looks like they have a long journey ahead of them. Where do you think they might be going?



5. Where do you think the young mother and baby are going?

3.1 Why do you think the mother might be worried about the bus being busy?

6. One person in the picture is dressed very smartly. What might his job be?

What is he doing in the picture?

Why is he doing that?

How do you think he is feeling?



3.2



The scene

3.2

1. Where are these people?

2. Is this scene set in the morning or the afternoon?


4. What is the weather like?

The people 1. What are the older couple in the middle of the picture looking at?



Why is the man pointing?

3.2 2. Two people are greeting each other. Which one has been travelling?

Where do you think he has been?

3. How do you think the young mother with two children is feeling?


How might her two children be feeling?



4. Why is the smartly dressed woman holding her head?

3.2 What do you think she will do next?

5. There is a man stood at the kiosk at the back. What do you think he is ordering?

Where do you think he is going?

What do you think he has in his bags?



3.3



The scene

3.3

1. Where is this scene set?

2. Is it in a small town or a big city?





The people

3.3

5. One man is on his laptop. What do you think he is doing?

What do you think his job might be?

Why is he not at work?

6. The older man is reading a newspaper. Why do you think he has two cups on his table?

7. Where do you think the mother and young girl have been before coming here?



Where do you think they might go next?

3.3 8. Where do you think the two young men might have been?

The young man without the cap is holding something. What do you think it is?

9. There are two ladies sat together. What do you think they are talking about?

One lady has not eaten her cake. Why might this be?



3.4



The scene

3.4

1. Where are these people?

2. What other things might be found in this place that are not in the picture?





The people

3.4

1. The little boy is crying. Why?

What do you think his father is saying to him?

2. Where are the two boys with racquets going?

Where do you think they have just been?

3. One person in this picture has lost something. What do you think they have lost?



What do you think they should do now?

3.4 4. One of the people in the scene is working. What might they work on next?

5. There are two people sat on the bench talking. How do they know each other?

How do you think the lady is feeling?

What do you think the man is saying to her?



3.5



The scene

3.5



3. Is the tide coming in or going out?

4. There are two towels on the beach. Where are the people who own them?

The people 1. Why is the little boy crying?



2. Who is the man with the spade?

3.5 How do you think he is feeling?

What is he saying?

3. Why is the boy in the middle of the picture laughing?

4. What has just happened to the young lady sat down?

How do you think she might be feeling?



5. Look at the mother and her daughter by the edge of the sea. What do you think

3.5

they are doing?

What might be in the bucket?

6. One man is stood by the sea. What is he doing?

Why do you think he might be doing that?

What do you think he should do next?



Narrative Sheet A 1. Choose one character from the scene that has been selected by your teacher. Describe what they are doing, thinking and feeling.

2. What happens to the character next? Do they have a problem?



Narrative Sheet A 3. How does the story finish? How does the character solve their problem?

4. How do they feel at the end?



Narrative Sheet B 1. Choose one character from the scene that has been selected by your teacher. 2. Describe what they are doing, thinking and feeling in the scene. 3. What happens to the character next? Do they have a problem? 4. How does the story finish? How does the character solve their problem? 5. How do they feel at the end?



Narrative Sheet B


Chapter 4

Sequencing Skills


4.1


Sequencing Skillsâ•…â•…97

4.2



4.3



4.4



4.5



4.6



4.7



4.8



4.9



4.10



4.11



4.12

References

Botting, N. and Adams, C. (2005) ‘Semantic and inferencing abilities in children with communication disorders.’ International Journal of Language and Communication Disorders 40, 1, 49–66. Cain, K. and Oakhill, J.V. (2001) ‘Comprehension skill, inference-making ability, and their relation to knowledge.’ Memory and Cognition 29, 6, 850–859. Department for Children, Schools and Families (2008) Effective Teaching of Inference Skills for Reading: Literature Review. Anne Kipsal. London: National Foundation for Educational Research. Eysenck, M.W. and Keane, M.T. (1995) Cognitive Psychology. Hove: Psychology Press Ltd. Joffe, V., Cruice, M. and Chiat, S. (eds) (2008) Language Disorders in Children and Adults: New Issues in Research and Practice. Chichester: Wiley-Blackwell. Wetherell, D., Botting, N. and Conti-Ramsden, G. (2007) ‘Narrative in adolescent specific language impairment (SLI): A comparison with peers across two different narrative genres.’ International Journal of Language and Communication Disorders 42, 5, 583–605.

109

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