Abstract of

Motivating Student Interest With the Imagine, Elaborate, Predict, and Confirm (IEPC) Strategy

Karen D. Wood

Clare Endres

In order to make predictions about a text, students must have prior knowledge or experiences about the topic and a means or a reason to retrieve this latent information and knowledge. The Imagine, Elaborate, Predict, and Confirm (IEPC) strategy takes the predictive process back to its origins in the imagination and extends it throughout the prereading, reading, and postreading stages of a lesson. The strength of IEPC appears to be in the whole-class participation aspect, which enables the teacher to guide, focus, and direct classwide responses and discussions, thereby capitalizing on the collective experiences of the students. The IEPC strategy has been sampled in over 30 classrooms ranging from kindergarten to middle and high school levels. While its elements are not new to teachers, the concept of having a tangible, visual framework to guide the predictive process throughout the reading seems to be beneficial for both teachers and students. The IEPC strategy has potential as a means to improve understanding and to motivate students to want to read assigned texts, both expository and narrative.

Abstract from Wood, K.D., & Endres, C. (2004, December). Motivating Student Interest With the Imagine, Elaborate, Predict, and Confirm (IEPC) Strategy. The Reading Teacher, 58(4), 346–357. doi: 10.1598/RT.58.4.4