Prediction
The second task, Prediction, follows the
summary task and asks students to consider the
story as it has unfolded and imagine what
might happen next. The prediction process
requires students to use their background
knowledge as it relates to the story. Students
relate what they know about life and people
(content schemata) to what they know about
the genre of the particular novel they are reading
and how it tends to develop (formal
schemata). The importance of having background
knowledge, not only for prediction but
also for basic comprehension, is an example of
the interactive nature of reading. Rather than
being a one-way process of extracting meaning
from text, meaning is created through the
interaction between the text and the background
knowledge the reader brings to the
process (Carrell and Eisterhold 1988).
Activating schemata before reading makes