Biased or fair?
You found these sentences on a web page. Sort each one. Is it biased, or is it fair?
Card 1 of 12
“A spider has eight legs.”
You found this sentence on a web page. Drag the card to a box, or tap a box.
What bias is
Bias is seeing something from only your own point of view. A biased sentence shows what the writer likes or does not like. A fair sentence tells you something that anyone can check.
The question to ask
Can you check it, or is it only what the writer feels?
- Could someone disagree? Nobody can disagree that a week has seven days. Plenty of people would disagree about which sport is the best.
- Can you measure it? You can measure how tall an animal is. You cannot measure how nice it is.
- Say the opposite. If the opposite sounds like something another person might really think, you are looking at an opinion.
Where each sentence goes
| Sentence | Box | Why |
|---|---|---|
| A spider has eight legs. | Fair | You can count the legs. Nobody can disagree with that. |
| Cricket is the best sport in the world. | Biased | The word “best” shows what the writer likes. A football fan would not agree. |
| Maths is the most boring subject. | Biased | This shows a dislike. Many pupils enjoy maths. |
| There are seven days in a week. | Fair | It is the same for everyone. You can check a calendar. |
| No other phone is as good as this one. | Biased | The writer likes one phone and has nothing good to say about the others. |
| Sri Lanka is an island. | Fair | A map shows the sea all around it. You can check. |
| An elephant is taller than a cat. | Fair | You can measure both animals. The answer does not change. |
| Cats are much nicer than dogs. | Biased | You cannot measure “nicer”. Someone with a dog would say the opposite. |
| Water turns into ice when it gets very cold. | Fair | You can test it in a freezer. It happens every time. |
| My town is the nicest town in the country. | Biased | The writer sees only their own town. People in other towns would say the same. |
| Lemons are yellow and they taste horrible. | Biased | The colour is a fact. But “horrible” is only what the writer feels. |
| In our class, 12 children said they like cricket best. | Fair | It only tells you what a count found. You can count again to check. |
Why it matters
Biased information is less reliable. A biased writer may leave out anything that does not fit what they like. When you look something up, read more than one website. If they all say the same thing, you can trust it more.
For teachers
This tool goes with Unit 2, Lesson 5 (Understanding bias) of the Year 4 Inspire Computing student book. It gives the class a set of sentences to argue about after Activity 1.
- The first round shows the cards in the same order on every device. Put it on the board and let the class vote with their hands before you tap a box.
- Every sentence was written for this tool. None of them is in the book, so pupils have to use the rule and cannot remember the answer.
- The last two cards of the first round are the hard ones. One has a fact and an opinion in the same sentence. The other is a fact about what people like. Both are worth stopping to talk about.
- Nothing a pupil does here is saved or sent anywhere.
More to try
- Write one fair sentence and one biased sentence about your favourite food.
- Change a biased card into a fair one. For example, turn the sentence about maths into something you could check.
- Find an advert. Which words in it show what the writer wants you to feel?
- Look up one fact on two different websites. Do they say the same thing?