3rd Grade

Unit 6: Taking a Stand

Summary of Unit: 

During this unit, students will be reading a variety of texts and forming opinions based on what they have read. Students will work on supporting their opinions with reasons and evidence from their readings. We will be focusing on the driving question: Do animals belong in captivity? 

Reading:

Curriculum: In this unit we will be returning to the genre of nonfiction.  Students will read different nonfiction texts and take a closer look at point of view, main idea, key details, text features, and they will continue to support their thinking with relevant information from the text.  Students will also be reading and partaking in debates, where students will choose a side and defend their thinking with relevant reason and evidence based from the text. .

Home Connection: While reading with your child at home, have them continue to read for 25-35 minutes each night. This is important to build stamina, vocabulary, background knowledge, and reading comprehension. You can also have your child practice reading aloud. Encourage him/her to read with fluency and expression! Your child should stop and ask questions before, during, and after they read. This will help them understand and analyze each part of the text.  

Continue to work on your IXL Skill plan nightly 

Materials: Unit texts, graphic organizers, scaffolds, Fiction & Nonfiction question prompts, Anchor Charts

Writing:

Curriculum:  Students will be working on opinion writing in this unit.  Students will begin the unit by learning about debates, choosing a side and sticking to it.  They will also learn about the difference between a reason and evidence.  After conducting extensive research, students will then produce an opinion piece to answer the question: Do animals belong in captivity?  

Based on their readings of both sides of the debate, students will have to form an opinion and support their point of view with reasons and text evidence. Students will be expected to introduce their topic, make a claim, provide reasons and evidence to support their opinion, and write a conclusion paragraph.  Students should also be able to connect their opinion and reasons with linking words and phrases that help their writing flow smoothly from one idea to the next. 

Home Connection: 

• To support opinion writing, you can ask your child questions that encourage them to choose a side and support why they chose that side.  For example, you can ask your child:
  • Are video games okay for kids? Prove it!  
  • Would you rather be able to fly or be able to turn invisible? Why?
  • Are plastic bottles handy or harmful? Prove it! 
  • Should students have to wear uniforms to school? Why or why not? 
  • Would you rather have a very strict teacher but learn a lot or have a very nice teacher but not learn much? Why? 

Materials: Notebook, pencil, graphic organizers, opinion writing scaffolds, and unit texts. 

Math:

Curriculum: Represent & Interpret Data

       During this unit students will focus on reading and making scaled picture graphs and scaled bar graphs that represent data sets that have several categories.  Students also solve problems involving the data represented in the graphs.  Students will analyze the picture or interval and identify how much each unit represents.  They will use addition, subtraction, and/or multiplication to determine the total represented by the data.  Students will learn to read bar graphs that are shown using horizontal or vertical bars.
      Next students will read data from a frequency table to create their own picture graph.  Students will create a key to represent how much each symbol represents. Students will see that the size of the numbers affects the choice of the scale.  Using a data table students will also be able to create bar graphs.  The students will use different intervals to represent all of the data from the data table.
      Lastly, students will learn to solve one and two step “how many more” and “how many less” problems using information represented in scaled picture graphs and scaled bar graphs.

Home Connection:  One way to include this math unit at home is practice answering questions such as ‘how many more;’ or ‘how many fewer’.  

Materials: Colored pencils, Grid paper, counters, 

Art:

For cycle 4 we have partnered with Chinese Theatre Workshop to bring our 3rd grade artists a workshop introducing them to Chinese arts and mask making. This will foster an understanding and appreciation of Chinese culture and traditional Chinese art making. 

Student Voice

 Unit 5 Reflection