Marking Inference in an Unseen Passage
An unseen passage of 54 words is followed by two questions. Passage: 'At forty, Meera bought a bicycle. For a week it stood in the corridor while she walked past it. On the eighth day she wheeled it to the playground at dawn, fell twice, and laughed. By the end of the month, the cycle had stopped waiting for her.' Question (a), 2 marks: 'What does the cycle had stopped waiting for her suggest?' Question (b), 1 mark: 'Find a word from the passage that means early morning.' Student 1 answers (a): 'The cycle was no longer parked in the corridor. It stopped waiting because she rode it.' Student 2 answers (a): 'Meera overcame her hesitation and began using the cycle regularly.' For (b), Student 1 writes 'dawn'; Student 2 writes 'morning'. The teacher must apply the mark scheme, which gives 2 for inference, 1 for a literal restatement, and 0 for an unrelated answer. The teacher also wants to use the scripts to teach the difference between reading for information and reading for meaning.
1. Which answer to (a) deserves 2 marks? Explain the difference between literal and inferential reading using the passage.
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Student 2 earns 2/2. 'Overcame hesitation and began using the cycle regularly' is an inference: the passage never states hesitation or regularity; it shows them through behaviour (walking past for a week, then falling and laughing, then the cycle 'stopped waiting'). Student 1 earns 1/2 because it is mostly a literal restatement: 'no longer parked' and 'she rode it' repeat the surface event. The phrase 'stopped waiting' is figurative - the cycle cannot wait - so the question tests interpretation of that figure. Student 1 notices the change but does not explain its meaning. Award 1 for a literal restatement as the scheme allows, and write: 'You have the event; now say what it shows about Meera.'
2. For (b), the instruction says 'find a word from the passage.' How should 'morning' be treated compared with 'dawn'?
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Student 1 gets 1/1 for 'dawn'; Student 2 gets 0/1 for 'morning'. The instruction is 'find a word from the passage', not 'give a synonym'. 'Dawn' is in the passage and means early morning. 'Morning' is a correct general synonym but is not the word used; accepting it would reward recall of vocabulary rather than reading the passage. To be fair, I would state the rule in class: if the question says 'from the passage', copy the exact word; if it says 'give a word meaning', a synonym is acceptable. This distinction is a reading skill, not a trick.
3. Write a 1-mark follow-up question that would test inference rather than recall, and give the expected answer.
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Follow-up (1 mark): 'Why does the writer say the cycle had stopped waiting for her rather than simply she rode the cycle?' Expected answer: because the cycle is personified as something that waited during Meera's hesitation; the phrase shows her change from avoidance to action. This tests inference and effect, not recall. A recall question would be 'When did Meera take the cycle to the playground?' - answer 'on the eighth day'. The follow-up asks students to interpret the writer's choice.