Even more frightening, we may well be dealing with writers who literally don't know and can't tell the difference.
I'm teaching a class in the writing of the expository essay, and our very first class discussion was on the difference between fact and opinion. It was a real eye-openers to see the criteria that students used for deciding whether a given statement was fact or opinion, including how certain the speaker/writer was of what they were saying.
I tried to get my students to think their way through some of these issues, but I don't know if it took. It's going to be interesting when we get to the class discussion that deals with evaluating sources. I have a feeling that it's going to be a really rough one.
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Date: 2008-03-06 03:29 pm (UTC)I'm teaching a class in the writing of the expository essay, and our very first class discussion was on the difference between fact and opinion. It was a real eye-openers to see the criteria that students used for deciding whether a given statement was fact or opinion, including how certain the speaker/writer was of what they were saying.
I tried to get my students to think their way through some of these issues, but I don't know if it took. It's going to be interesting when we get to the class discussion that deals with evaluating sources. I have a feeling that it's going to be a really rough one.