Lesson Plan

Fact or Opinion?

Teach Starter Publishing
60 mins | Suitable for years: 3 - 4

A 60 minute lesson in which students will identify the difference between a fact and an opinion.

 

Tuning In

  • Remind the students that the purpose of informative texts is to provide information about a particular topic using facts. Ask the students:
    • What is the purpose of an informative text?
    • What are some types of informative texts?
    • How do informative texts differ from imaginary texts?
  • Watch the Fact or Opinion for Kids video on YouTube. After watching, ask the students:
    • What is a fact?
    • Where can we find facts?
    • What is an opinion?

Teacher Instruction

  • Project the Bat Facts and Opinions Worksheet on the board. Read each of the statements on the worksheet and ask the students to identify whether or not the statement is a fact or an opinion. Encourage the students to provide justification for their responses.
  • Remind the students of the two texts about owls from the previous lesson. Draw a picture of an owl on the board. Encourage the students to suggest some facts about owls (write these inside the owl picture) and some opinions about owls (write these around the outside of the owl picture).

Guided/Independent Learning

  • Project the Fact or Opinion? Digital Learning Activity on the board. As a class, work through the activities to explore the facts and opinions about space. Have volunteers come up to the computer to drag and drop the answers or to type responses into the text boxes provided. (Be sure to keep it in Edit mode to enable the drag and drop functionality.)

Wrapping Up

  • Play the I Have, Who Has? Fact and Opinion Game as a class. Provide each student with a card. The student that has the sentence 'I am the starter' begins the game by standing up and reading their card. Once they have read their clue, the student that has the matching fact or opinion on their card stands up and reads what is on their card. The game continues until the last person reads out 'I am the winner'.

Differentiation

Extending Students

  • Encourage fast finishers to write another fact and another opinion for each of the topics on the worksheet.

Supporting Students

  • Allow any students who are finding the sorting activity challenging to work in a small group with a teacher or teacher aide.

Suggested Assessment Strategies

  • used strategic whole class or individual questioning
  • observed student participation during learning activities
  • recorded student progress on a checklist
  • annotated student work samples
  • collected and reviewed student work samples
  • facilitated whole class or peer feedback sessions
  • encouraged student self-reflection
  • administered formal assessment tasks.

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Stephanie (Teach Starter)
Teach Starter Publishing

Teach Starter Publishing

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