Fun Activity for Informational Text

 Fun with Informational Text

Third-graders are in love with learning.  They’re fascinated with everything around them; worms, rocks, space stories, prehistoric animals, just about everything.  That’s one of the reasons, eight and nine-year-olds are such fun.

It’s at this age that students begin to read to learn instead of just learn to read.  One thing I always made sure was plentiful in my classroom was informational text.  For every science or social studies unit I checked out tons of books from our school or local library so the kids could have lots of resources close by.

One of my favorite activities with informational text is True and False Facts. It’s super simple.  Students can work on their own or with a partner.  

• Let them choose a nonfiction (informational) text.  It can be from a collection of books on a topic you’re studying or one on a topic they choose.
• As they read the book, they jot down interesting facts.
• Encourage them to collected 15-20 facts.

• Next, have them change five of these true facts into false facts.  This can be done by changing one small thing about the fact.  For example, if the fact mentions a location, they can change it to a different, false, location.  

        True:  Mt. Everest is the tallest mountain in Asia.

         False:  Mt. Everest is the tallest mountain in Europe.

• Now they have five false facts and 10-15 true facts.  Write the true and false facts on separate cards.
• Students exchange fact cards and sort them into true/false stacks.  
• To strengthen research skills, keep the book with the fact cards.  That way, students can find the evidence for the true and false facts in the text while they sort the cards.

This activity is part of my Informational Text Tool Box. It's packed with everything you need to teach your students how to use informational text. Click on the image to check out this amazing resource.