Day 3 · Wednesday

Objective: I can find four major U.S. rivers on a map and explain why rivers matter to people.

Standards: D2.Geo.2.3-5, D2.Geo.8.3-5

Materials: U.S. map that shows rivers, laid flat, Blue yarn or string, about 3 feet, Scissors, 4 index cards, Glass of water, Dinner plate, Notebook, Pencil

1. Warm-Up · 5 min

   Spaced review from Week 4. Ask: "Name one landform that a river can carve." (A canyon or a valley.) Then hold up the glass of water. Ask: "Where does our faucet water come from?" (Many towns use rivers, lakes or wells.) Say: "Today we find out why big cities sit beside rivers."

2. Mini-Lesson · 10–15 min

   Tip the plate over a sink and pour a little water at the high edge. Say: "Water always runs downhill, from higher land to lower land. Rivers do the same." Trace the Mississippi on the map. Say: "The Mississippi River starts at Lake Itasca in Minnesota. It flows south about 2,300 miles to the Gulf of Mexico." Say: "A tributary is a smaller river that flows into a bigger one." Trace two. "The Missouri River starts in the Rocky Mountains and joins the Mississippi near St. Louis. The Ohio River starts at Pittsburgh and joins it at the southern tip of Illinois." Trace the Colorado. "In the West, the Colorado River carved the Grand Canyon over millions of years." Say: "Rivers give people water, a road for boats, and rich soil for farms." Ask: "Which way does the Mississippi flow?" (South.) "Name its two big tributaries." (Missouri and Ohio.) If stuck, say: "Put your finger where the river starts. Slide toward the sea."

3. Activity / Source Work · 15–20 min

   Yarn rivers and a river town. 1) With scissors, cut one long piece of yarn and three short pieces. 2) Your child lays the long piece along the Mississippi, from Minnesota to the Gulf. 3) Add the Missouri and the Ohio so each joins the Mississippi. Add the Colorado in the Southwest. 4) Label four index cards, each with a river and a place beside it. Mississippi: New Orleans. Missouri: Kansas City. Ohio: Cincinnati. Colorado: Grand Canyon. Your child sets each card by its river. 5) Read this source aloud: "St. Louis began as a trading post near the place where the Missouri meets the Mississippi. Boats could reach it from the north, the south and the west. Traders brought furs and farmers brought grain to its docks. Riverboats carried those goods down to New Orleans. By 1850 it was one of the ten largest cities in the country." 6) Ask: "Find two pieces of evidence that rivers helped St. Louis grow." (Boats reached it from three directions. Steamboats carried goods to New Orleans.)

4. Notebook Entry · 10 min

   Your child sketches the four rivers on a rough United States outline. An arrow on each shows which way it flows. Then finish two frames. "Rivers help people by ___, ___ and ___." (Giving water, carrying boats and goods, leaving rich soil.) "The Missouri is a tributary because ___." (It flows into a bigger river, the Mississippi.)

5. Exit Ticket · 5 min

   Read each question aloud. Your child answers in the notebook and shows each river on the map. Praise answers that use the word tributary.

Homework: Your child asks a family member where your home's drinking water comes from and writes one sentence. Look for a named river, lake, reservoir or well.

Objective: I can read and write division sentences and name the dividend, divisor and quotient.

Standards: 3.OA.A.2

Materials: 3 index cards or paper slips marked dividend, divisor and quotient, 30 counters (dried beans, coins or buttons), Notebook, Pencil

1. Warm-Up · 5 min

   Spaced review from Week 1. Your child rounds 583 to the nearest 10 and the nearest 100 (580, 600). Then practice ×6 facts with no clock. Ask 6 × 3, 6 × 6 and 6 × 8 (18, 36, 48). Your child tells how one answer was found.

2. Mini-Lesson · 10–15 min

   Say: "A multiplication sentence has factors and a product. A division sentence has names too." Write 15 ÷ 3 = 5 and read it aloud. Lay the dividend card under 15. Say: "The dividend is the total we divide. It comes first." Lay the divisor card under 3. Say: "The divisor is the number we divide by. It can be the number of groups or the size of each group." Lay the quotient card under 5. Say: "The quotient is the answer." Your child builds it both ways with 15 beans. Ask: "Shared into 3 piles, how many are in each pile?" (5) "In piles of 3, how many piles?" (5) Say: "So 15 ÷ 3 = 5 both ways." Next, turn a story into a sentence. Say: "18 crayons go equally into 3 boxes." Ask: "What is the total? What do we divide by?" (18; 3) Write 18 ÷ 3 = 6. Say: "So 18 ÷ 3 = 6. Each box gets 6 crayons." Now your child does more. Say: "30 beads, with 5 on each string." Your child writes the division sentence and lays the three cards. (30 ÷ 5 = 6; dividend 30, divisor 5, quotient 6)

3. Guided Practice · 10–15 min

   1) Write 24 ÷ 4 = 6. Your child reads it aloud and lays the three cards. (Dividend 24, divisor 4, quotient 6.) 2) Say: "Twenty divided by 2 equals 10." Your child writes the sentence and names the quotient. (20 ÷ 2 = 10; quotient 10) 3) Say: "12 eggs sit in 2 equal rows." Your child writes the sentence. (12 ÷ 2 = 6) Ask: "Which number is the divisor?" (2) 4) Say: "Tom shared 18 beans among 3 friends. He wrote 3 ÷ 18." Ask: "What should he fix?" (The total comes first: 18 ÷ 3 = 6.) If stuck, say: "What is the total being split? Write that number first. Then write what you divide by."

4. Independent Practice · 15–20 min

   Your child writes each division sentence and solves it with beans or a drawing. 1) 20 ÷ 4 (5). 2) 14 ÷ 2 (7). 3) 18 split into 6 equal groups (18 ÷ 6 = 3). 4) 28 with 4 in each group (28 ÷ 4 = 7). 5) "Twenty-seven divided by 3" (27 ÷ 3 = 9). 6) You draw 2 circles with 9 dots in each. Your child writes the sentence. (18 ÷ 2 = 9) 7) A teacher shares 24 pencils equally among 8 tables. How many pencils go to each table? (24 ÷ 8 = 3) 8) Rosa has 30 photos. She puts 6 on each page. How many pages does she fill? (30 ÷ 6 = 5) Last, your child circles every quotient and underlines every dividend.

5. Exit Ticket · 5 min

   Turn the three word cards face down. Read each question aloud; your child answers on paper.

Fact fluency: ×6 facts

Homework: Your child writes 3 division sentences about things at home and labels the parts in one. Sample: 12 socks in pairs, 12 ÷ 2 = 6; dividend 12, divisor 2, quotient 6.

Objective: I can write an opening that shows the setting and introduces the characters.

Standards: W.3.3.A, RL.3.7

Materials: Writer's notebook, One of your child's own picture books (any), Colored pencils, Pencil

1. Warm-Up · 5 min

   Word study, about 3 minutes. Dictate: "Dad dropped the bag when we stopped shopping." Your child writes it. Check it together: the capital, the period, and the double p in dropped, stopped and shopping. Ask: "Why does shop double its p?" (one short vowel, then one consonant) Spaced review from Week 6. Ask: "What does a caption tell you?" (It tells about the picture.)

2. Mini-Lesson · 10–15 min

   Open the picture book to a page that shows a place. Ask: "What do you learn about this place from the picture alone?" (Sample: the weather, the time of day, how crowded it is.) Ask: "What mood does the picture give: cozy, busy or spooky?" (Answers vary.) Say: "Pictures add to the words. In your story, your words must paint the picture." Write the opening pattern in the notebook: time, place, sense detail, character. Read the model, "At the Pool": On a windy Tuesday afternoon, I stood at the edge of the community pool. The water smelled like bleach and sunscreen. My cousin Amara was already splashing in the deep end, waving at me with both arms. Think aloud, one finger for each part: "Time: a windy Tuesday afternoon. Place: the edge of the community pool. Sense detail: the smell of bleach and sunscreen. Character: my cousin Amara, splashing and waving. All four are here."

3. Guided Practice · 10–15 min

   Read this weak opening: One day I went somewhere with my grandma. It was fun. 1) Ask: "Which of the four parts can you find?" (a character, Grandma) 2) Ask: "What is missing or fuzzy?" (the exact time, the place, a sense detail) 3) Fix it aloud together. (Sample: On the last night of June, Grandma and I stepped into the bus station. The benches felt cold, and a loudspeaker crackled.) 4) Draft one opening for your child's own moment together. Count the four parts on your fingers and fix what is missing. If stuck, say: "Close your eyes. You are there. What do you smell or hear first?"

4. Independent Practice · 15–20 min

   1) Your child writes two different openings for the same moment, each 3 or 4 sentences long. Frame: "On ___ (time), I was at ___ (place). I could ___ (sense). ___ (character) was ___." 2) The second opening may start with a sound instead. 3) Your child draws a small colored-pencil sketch beside each opening. 4) Your child adds an arrow note naming one thing only the sketch shows. 5) Your child stars the stronger opening and says why. Checklist: a time, a place, a sense detail, and a character doing something.

5. Exit Ticket · 5 min

   Ask the three questions. Your child answers from the starred opening and its sketch.

Homework: Read your own book for 15 minutes. Then study one picture page. Write one sentence about what the picture adds to the words. Look for: a detail about the setting, a character or the mood.

Practice page · Week 10, Day 3

English Language Arts

I can write an opening that shows the setting and the characters.

Show answers

Look: A strong opening

1. Time: tell when it happened.
2. Place and a sense detail: tell where, and what you saw, heard, smelled or felt.
3. Character: tell who is there and one thing they are doing.

An Opening

Early on a foggy Saturday, I followed my aunt Bea into the busy fish market. The floor was wet and slippery, and the air smelled like salt and ice. A man in tall rubber boots shouted prices over the noise. Aunt Bea squeezed my hand and pointed at a crab waving one claw at us.

Use the opening above.

1. 1.

   When does it happen?
2. 2.

   Where does it happen?
3. 3.

   Underline one sense detail.

4. 4.

   Who are the characters?
5. 5.

   What could a picture show about this setting that the words do not say?
6. 6.

   Write a 3-sentence opening for your own small moment with a time, a place, a sense detail and a character.

Circle the word that is spelled right.

1. 7.

   Which is right?

   ○ siting○ sitting
2. 8.

   Which is right?

   ○ hugged○ huged

Objective: I can sort living things into producers, consumers and decomposers by how they get their food.

Standards: 3-LS4-3

Materials: 12 index cards, Three paper plates labeled Producer, Consumer, Decomposer, Green, red and brown crayons, A leaf or a houseplant, Science notebook, Pencil

1. Day 48 — Producers, Consumers, Decomposers — Wonder Warm-Up · 5 min

   Spaced review from Week 2. Ask: "Two people pull a rope equally hard in opposite directions. Does the rope move?" (No. The forces are balanced.) Then ask: "Where does a plant get its food? Where do you get yours?" Write both answers down to check later.

2. Mini-Lesson · 10–15 min

   Say: "Living things get food in three ways." Hold up the leaf. Say: "Producers make their own food. A plant uses sunlight, air and water to make sugar in its leaves." Say: "Soil gives a plant water and minerals. Soil is not its food." Next say: "Consumers eat other living things. An herbivore eats plants, like a rabbit. A carnivore eats animals, like a hawk. An omnivore eats both, like a raccoon." Then say: "Decomposers break down dead plants and animals. Mushrooms, mold and tiny bacteria do this. They return nutrients to the soil." Ask: "A cow eats only grass. What kind of consumer is it?" (Herbivore.) Ask: "Mold grows on old bread. What is its role?" (Decomposer.) Ask: "You eat chicken and carrots. What are you?" (Omnivore.) If stuck, say: "Does it make food, eat food, or break down dead things?"

3. Investigation / Hands-On · 15–20 min

   Card Sort. 1) Write one name on each card: oak tree, grass, sunflower, algae, rabbit, deer, hawk, raccoon, honeybee, mushroom, bread mold, earthworm. 2) Your child puts each card on a plate and says a reason. Sample: "The deer is a consumer because it eats plants." 3) On each consumer card they write H, C or O. 4) Count the cards on each plate and check. Producers (4): oak tree, grass, sunflower, algae. Consumers (6): rabbit H, deer H, hawk C, raccoon O, honeybee H, earthworm (no letter). Decomposers (2): mushroom and bread mold. The earthworm is an animal that eats dead leaves, so it is a consumer. Its chewing helps the decomposers. Many books call it a decomposer, so accept that plate with this reason. 5) Reread the warm-up answer about plant food and fix it together if needed.

4. Science Notebook Entry · 10 min

   Draw a three-column chart with a green heading for Producers, red for Consumers and brown for Decomposers. Your child writes the 12 names. Then give two frames: "Plants make their food from ___, ___ and ___." (sunlight, air and water) "A ___ is a ___ because ___." Look for: "A hawk is a consumer because it eats other animals."

5. Wrap-Up & Exit Ticket · 5 min

   Ask the three questions aloud. Praise answers that tell how the living thing gets its food, not just its name.

Homework: In a yard, park or kitchen, find one producer, one consumer and one decomposer. Moldy food counts; look, but do not touch or sniff. Look for a labeled drawing of each.