Fact or Opinion Lesson Plan

Lesson plan to explain to students that facts are always true while opinions vary from person to person.

Theme: fact vs. Opinion

Year: Elementary School

Required Material: Paper sheets

goal

Students will be able to distinguish between fact and opinion.

Introduction

• Say, "I think oranges are the best fruit in the whole world."
• Ask students to raise their hands if they agree with you.
• Ask students if their statement was an example of fact or opinion.

Instructions

• Explain that the facts are always true, while opinions vary from person to person. Opinions show people's thinking and personal preferences.
• Tell students that you are going to read some sentences written on a piece of paper. Some will be facts, like "People are mammals", and some will be opinions, like "People are the craziest mammals".
• On the board, write “Fact” on one side and “Opinion” on the other. Take the sentence sheets and read the statement aloud.
• Ask students if this statement is a fact or an opinion. Paste the phrase in the appropriate section of the board.
• Repeat this process with all cards.

guided practice

• Ask for volunteers to share statements that are facts or opinions.
• When selecting students, write their statements on sheets.
• Ask the rest of the class to determine whether the sentence is fact or opinion.

Independent working time

• Distribute five cards to each student. Ask them to write a fact or opinion on each one.
• When students are finished, put them into groups of four. Ask them to work together to sort all of their sheets (20 in all) into piles.
• fact and opinion.
• Once sorting is complete, students can fill in the worksheets.

Differentiation

Support: Ask students to use the phrases to fill in their opinion statements, such as “I like ____” or “The best ____ is ____”.

Enrichment: If students finish the activity quickly, they can write paragraphs based on facts or opinions and then share them with each other.

Assessment

Assess how students are distinguishing between fact and opinion.

review and finalize

Ask volunteers to share some phrases that their groups rated and how they labeled them (fact or opinion).

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