Grade 3

Literacy

OVERVIEW

The Reading Rope is a simple way to understand how a child learns to read. It's a foundational concept within the science of reading, created by literacy expert Dr. Hollis Scarborough, and serves as a helpful image for parents and teachers. Think of it as a real rope made of many smaller strands that are all woven together. Reading isn't just one skill; it's a combination of many.

The rope has two main parts:

Word Recognition: This is about figuring out the words on a page. It includes skills like sounding out words and recognizing them instantly.
Language Comprehension: This is about understanding what those words mean. It includes skills like having a good vocabulary and understanding the topic you're reading about.

When all the strands of the Reading Rope are strong and woven together, a child can become a skilled, fluent reader. This is the core principle of our literacy program at Woburn Public Schools. Our comprehensive Literacy Block, used at every grade level, is designed with multiple programs to address each and every one of these vital components.

In third grade, your child will build strong reading and writing skills by analyzing and creating a variety of texts.

Reading

Students will work with two main types of texts:

Narrative (Stories): They will learn to understand stories better by focusing on the characters' traits and motivations (why they do things). They'll also follow the sequence of events, paying attention to how one event causes another. They'll use what they know and what the text says to figure out the theme or main message of a story. They'll also compare stories from different cultures.
Expository (Informational): Expository (Informational): This is where students become detectives! They'll learn to find the main idea and key details in a text. They'll also use different text features like bold words, charts, and photos to understand information. They'll learn to understand and explain how things are connected in a text, like cause and effect, or a problem and its solution.

Writing

Students will develop their writing skills in three different areas:

Narrative: Writing: Students will write their own stories about things that happened or that they imagine. They will learn to create a clear beginning, middle, and end. They'll also use descriptive language to make their stories more interesting for the reader.
Informational: Students will write about a topic and share facts to teach others. They'll learn to organize their writing with a clear introduction and conclusion. They'll also use facts and details to support their main idea.
Opinion: Your child will learn to share their thoughts and opinions on a topic or book. They will give clear reasons to support their ideas and use words like "for example" to give evidence.

Throughout the year, students also work on building their vocabulary, using correct grammar, and becoming more confident communicators.

Unit 1: Narrative Reading: Story Structure

Learning Targets

Students will answer questions about a story and show where I found the answers in the text.
Students will describe characters by telling about their feelings, what they want, and what they do.
Students will explain how a character's actions change what happens in the story.
Students will determine the meaning of new words, including the difference between real words and figurative language (like "raining cats and dogs").
Students will identify a story's problem and solution and explain how one part of the story leads to the next.

Essential Questions

How do story elements help me understand a story?
How do characters help stories to move along?

Questions to Ask at Home

How did the story's problem get solved? What clues from the story helped you figure that out?
Tell me about one of the characters. What did they do that was a surprise? How did their actions affect the story?
What's a new word you learned? Can you tell me if the author used it in a real way or a different, fun way?

Unit 2: Narrative Writing

Learning Targets

Students will write a story about something that happened to me or something I imagined.
Students will make their story interesting by using details and putting the events in order.
Students will plan, revise, and edit their writing to make it better.
Students will use a computer to write and publish their stories.

Essential Questions

How do story elements help me understand a story?
How do characters help stories to move along?

Questions to Ask at Home

Why did you decide to write your story? What feeling or idea did you want to share?
How did you make your story more exciting for the reader? What details did you add to help them imagine it better?
What was your favorite part of writing this story? Why?

Unit 3: Narrative Reading: Theme

Learning Targets

Students will identify the main message or lesson of a story and explain it using details.
Students will retell fables, folktales, and myths from different places and explain the lesson they teach.
Students will compare two different stories and find what they have in common.

Essential Questions

How can stories from around the world teach you life lessons?

Questions to Ask at Home

What lesson did the character learn in the story? How do you know?
Think about a story you read from another country. What did it teach you about that culture or about people in general?
We read two stories this week. How were they similar even though they were about different things?

Unit 4: Expository Writing

Learning Targets

Students will write to teach others about a topic.
Students will put facts and details together in my writing to explain their topic clearly.
Students will use linking words (like "also" and "but") to connect their ideas.
Students will end their writing with a concluding statement.

Essential Questions

What is the purpose of expository writing?
How do I write clearly to share information with my reader?

Questions to Ask at Home

What was the main idea of your writing? How did you make sure your reader would understand it?
How did you group your information together? Why did you decide to organize it that way?
What did you learn about your topic that you didn't know before?

Unit 5: Narrative Writing: Point of View/Author's Purpose

Learning Targets

Students will explain why an author wrote a story.
Students will identify the difference between my point of view and a character's point of view.
Students will explain how pictures in a story help tell the story.

Essential Questions

Why do authors write stories?

Questions to Ask at Home

Why do you think the author wrote this story? Was it to teach you something, make you laugh, or something else?
How is your opinion about the main character different from what they think about themselves?
Look at the pictures. How do they help you understand the story's mood or a character's feelings?

Unit 6: Expository Reading: Reading for Understanding

Learning Targets

Students will find and use information in nonfiction books to answer questions.
Students will determine the main idea of a text and explain how the details support it.
Students will use illustrations, maps, and other features to understand a text.
Students will identify the meaning of new words in a nonfiction text.

Essential Questions

Why do we read nonfiction?
How do we read "between the lines"?
How do I use what I know about life to make me a better reader?

Questions to Ask at Home

What did you learn from the text? Where in the text did you find that information?
What's the most important thing the author wants you to remember about this topic?
How did the pictures or captions help you understand the words in the book?

Unit 7: Expository Reading: Text Structure

Learning Targets

Students will explain how different parts of a text are connected, like cause and effect.
Students will use features like a table of contents or headings to find information quickly.
Students will describe how the author organized the information (e.g., in a sequence or by comparing things).

Essential Questions

Why is information organized in different ways?

Questions to Ask at Home

How did the author organize the information in this book? Why do you think they chose that way?
Find a sentence that tells you about a cause and effect. What was the cause? What was the effect?
How did you use the text's features (like bold words or headings) to help you read and understand it better?

Unit 8: Expository Reading: Point of View/Author's Purpose

Learning Targets

Students will identify that authors write nonfiction for a specific purpose.
Students will determine difference between my own opinion and the author's point of view.

Essential Questions

Why do you read nonfiction?
Why do authors write nonfiction?

Questions to Ask at Home

Why do you think this author wrote this book? What did they want you to know?
Is there anything in the book you disagree with? Why or why not?
How does the author's point of view affect how they present the information?

Unit 9: Opinion Writing

Learning Targets

Students will write a paper stating their opinion on a topic.
Students will give reasons and examples to support their opinion.
Students will use linking words to connect their reasons.
Students will write a concluding sentence that summarizes their opinion.

Essential Questions

What is the purpose of opinion writing?
How can your voice make a difference in your community and world?

Questions to Ask at Home

What is your opinion on this topic? What reasons did you include to convince your reader?
How did you make your argument stronger? Did you add more details or examples?
How could your writing help someone in your community or the world? What change would you like to see?

NARRATIVE TEXTS

Stone Soup by Jon J. Muth
The Keeping Quilt by Patricia Polacco
Where the Wild Things Are by Maurice Sendak
The Three Billy Goats Gruff by Paul Galdone:
The Story of Ferdinand by Munro Leaf

EXPOSITORY TEXTS

Click, Clack, Moo: Cows That Type by Doreen Cronin
The Important Book by Margaret Wise Brown
The Boy Who Loved Maps by Kari Allen
The Man Who Walked Between the Towers by Mordicai Gerstein
Pop! The Invention of Bubble Gum by Meghan McCarthy

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