Grade 3
Teachers: Seth, Dave, Pete
Possible Units of Study
Reading
Comprehension Strategies
• Main Idea
• Setting
• Inference
• Determining Importance
• Drawing Conclusions
Skills
• Reads Directions
• Context Clues
• Uses text features appropriately
• Stamina
Components of the Literacy Block
• Read Aloud
• Guided Reading
• Shared Reading
• Word Study / Spelling / Vocabulary Work
• Independent Reading
Genre / Author Study
• Poetry
• Informational Text
• Historical Fiction
• Video
Writing
September/October
Establishing successful routines for Writer’s Workshop.
Introduction to Writer’s Notebooks for the year.
Writing daily by choosing topics independently to improve stamina.
Students have opportunities to share finished work with a selected audience.
Learning to write about people who are meaningful in their lives.
Using graphic organizers before drafting to organize work.
Learning how to interview one another.
Connecting drawings to personal narrative.
Learning how to brainstorm effectively.
Creating webs/lists of topics to write about in Writer’s Notebooks.
Learning how to use transition words (finally, after that, in conclusion.)
Using descriptive language to create an image in the reader’s mind.
Writes voluntarily to communicate ideas and emotions to a variety of people.
November/December
Using both simple and compound sentences.
Writes legibly all uppercase and lowercase letters.
Begins to choose details that establish a mood and keeping the reader interested.
Includes different types of characters in stories that are developed using dialogue and description.
Students are learning how to write an effective opening and closing in their written work through studying mentor texts.
Developing stamina as a writer (30-40 minutes a day of uninterrupted writing time.)
Learning how to describe a small moment.
Using revision process to make sure writing makes sense and has fluidity.
Beginning to edit for appropriate punctuation.
Learning to use paragraphs to separate time and change within a story.
Beginning to establish voice in personal narrative.
Has a clear beginning, middle and end.
January/February
Using dialogue to express inner thoughts of the character.
Using different forms of punctuation.
Developing different ways to begin a sentence.
Makes decisions about which events are important to include and which to leave out when writing a story.
Understands and practices the difference between revising and editing.
Begins to use formal language patterns in place of oral language patterns.
Clearly describes the character, setting and plot of written work by studying various mentor texts.
Beginning to develop voice in writing by revealing inner thoughts through dialogue.
Spelling many frequently used words correctly
Discovering the heartbeat and main idea of the story.
Beginning to improve grammar skills (comma in a series, contractions, exclamation marks and quotation marks in dialogue.)
March/April
Uses revision strategies to develop writing, including conferring with teachers and peers, as well as cutting and pasting.
Studying non-fiction texts to understand how to develop and write travel brochures regarding the Arctic study.
Learning how to write a persuasive blurb about a specific place.
Developing caption writing and map design to convey important information about a given topic.
Learning how to paraphrase, categorize and summarize research evident in travel brochures for Arctic Study.
Introduces the topic providing a context.
Has an organizational structure that is useful to read.
Uses diagrams, charts and illustrations that are appropriate to the text.
Communicates big ideas that have been elaborated on or illustrated through facts, detail and information.
May/ June
Students organized and presented information during Arctic celebration orally using notes and other memory aids.
During the Arctic study, students used information from sources/ documents to respond in writing to questions and various prompts.
Understand how to use a Table of Contents, Glossary and Index in their work.
Continuing to build vocabulary in discussions and writings in the areas of history, economics, geography and government.
Can categorize and classify information by using tables, graphs, charts and maps.
Learning how to write effective paragraphs by using the “burger” method to structure written work.
Learning how to write persuasive essays regarding a topic that students choose independently.
Persuasive essay is supported by a topic sentence, concrete examples and a conclusion.
Social Studies
Community Study
Concepts / Big Ideas
• People within a community have wants and needs
• There are goods and services within a community to meet the wants and needs
• Traditions, culture and values exist within communities
• People within a community depend on each other
Meetings / Questions
• What is a community?
• What are a neighborhood, borough, city, state, and country?
• How does a community meet the needs and wants of its people?
• What is the difference between needs and wants?
• How are community members interdependent?
• Why does a community have rules?
• How do values and traditions affect members of a community?
Activities
• Weekly trips / trip sheets
• Photographic groups during weekly trips
• Planning out subway routes to various communities in New York City
• Class Banners
• Family Banners
Resources
• Various Books
• Trip Sheets
• Maps
• Speakers
• Videos
Investigation in Number, Data and Space
Third Grade - Sequence of Math Units
Trading Stickers and Combining Coins
Number and Operations: Addition, Subtraction, and the Number System
Surveys and Line Plots
Data Analysis
Collections and Travel Stories
Number and Operations: Addition, Subtraction, and the Number System
Perimeter, Angles, and Area
2-D Geometry and Measurement
Equal Groups
Number and Operations: Multiplication and Division
Stories, Tables, And Graphs
Patterns, Functions, and Change
Finding Fair Shares
Number and Operations: Rational Number
How Many Hundreds? How Many Miles?
Number and Operations: Addition, Subtraction, and the Number System
Solids and Boxes
3-D Geometry and Measurement
David Pitshone