• 3rd Grade ELA - Overarching Concepts

     

    1. Apply reading strategies to gain understanding of text

    2. Infer to make meaning from text

    3. Apply a range of strategies to deepen the meaning of known, unknown, and multi-meaning vocabulary

    4. Produce writings in which the development, organization, and style are appropriate to task, purpose, discipline, and audience

    5. Students should be reading independently within the Lexile range of 487 - 820

     

     

     

    Literacy Framework—Philosophy

    Ï㽶ӰÊÓ considers literacy to be the primary element in promoting student growth as thinkers and communicators. Rich experiences in reading, writing, listening, and speaking for all students foster self-directed and lifelong learners. We believe

    • All students should have access to literacy-rich environments.
    • Home-school connections are essential in supporting student growth in literacy.
    • Collaboration among schools, families, and community members is critical to promoting literacy development.

    Literacy Framework Pillars are:

    • Reading
    • Writing
    • Communication
    • Environment

    Fundamentals of Reading, Writing, and Communication

     

    Teachers at all grade levels and in all disciplines should refer to the Fundamentals when determining what students use or neglect as they read, write, and communicate. Engagement increases as students take ownership of their learning through personal understanding and implementation of the reading, writing, and communication processes.

     

    Fundamentals of Reading

    • Integrate an information (cueing) system that includes meaning (semantics), structure (syntax), visual (graphophonic), and pragmatics (schematic) to make meaning from text.
    • Gain understanding by applying reading strategies of monitoring, searching, confirming, crosschecking, rereading, and self-correcting.
    • Employ comprehension strategies before, during, and after reading text using schema, annotating, questioning, visualizing, drawing inferences, determining importance, summarizing, and synthesizing.
    • Use metacognition to monitor meaning and adjust strategies while reading.
    • Notice and analyze the styles and techniques authors use to help readers construct meaning

    Fundamentals of Writing

    • Employ a recursive writing process that includes planning, drafting, revising, editing, rewriting, publishing, and reflecting.
    • Interact and collaborate with peers and adults to develop and strengthen writing.
    • Produce writing in which the development, organization, and style are appropriate to task, purpose, discipline, and audience.
    • Use clear and coherent written language to accomplish a purpose such as learning, enjoyment, argument, and the exchange of information.
    • Monitor progress throughout the writing process and adjust strategies as needed from independence to collaboration within a writing community.
    • Incorporate authors’ craft techniques observed from wide reading of anchor and mentor texts across disciplines to inform, explain, convince/argue, and entertain

    Fundamentals of Communication

    • Employ a reciprocal communication process that includes planning, drafting, revising, editing, reviewing, presenting, and reflecting.
    • Communicate using style, language, and nonverbal cues appropriate to task, purpose, and audience.
    • Use active and attentive communication skills, building on other’s ideas to explore, learn, enjoy, argue, and exchange information.
    • Monitor delivery and reception throughout the communication process and adjust approach and strategies as needed.
    • Adjust speech, using standard English when indicated or appropriate, in a variety of contexts and tasks for presenting or participating in the social exchange of ideas.
    • Acquire vocabulary from multiple forms of communication; use newly acquired vocabulary to appropriately communicate in a variety of situations and contexts.
      • Source: South Carolina College- and Career-Ready Standards 2015

     

     

    3rd Grade Math - Overarching Concepts

     

    Overview

    In Grade 3, instructional time should focus on depth in four critical areas: (1) developing understanding of multiplication and division and strategies for multiplication and division within 100; (2) developing understanding of fractions, especially unit fractions (fractions with numerator 1); (3) developing understanding of the structure of rectangular arrays and of area; and (4) describing and analyzing two-dimensional shapes. Additionally, third grade gifted and talented mathematics courses should reflect the following characteristics: content, process, and product standards that exceed the state adopted standards, goals, and indicators that require students to demonstrate depth and complexity of knowledge and skills, instructional strategies that accommodate the unique needs of gifted learners, and an approach that incorporates acceleration and enrichment in mathematics. Teaching styles associated with this course may include but are not limited to: whole group instruction, stations/rotations, small group differentiation, problem-based learning, instructional videos, interactive websites, and hands-on explorations.

     

     

    Overarching Concepts:

    Multiplication Fluency

    Division Fluency

    Problem Solving Strategies

    Use of number lines for varying concepts

    Concrete models

    Fractions

    Arithmetic patterns

    Elapsed Time

    Using a variety of units

     

    Course Outline:

    Quarter 1: Number Sense and Base Ten & Algebraic Thinking and Operations

    Quarter 2: Algebraic Thinking and Operations

    Quarter 3: Number Sense - Fractions, Measurement and Data, and Elapsed Time

    Quarter 4: Measurement and Data Analysis & Geometry

     

    3rd Grade Science - Overarching Concepts

    The South Carolina Academic Standards and Performance Indicators are the basis for the development of knowledge for the third grade science curriculum. The standards and indicators are emphasized using science and engineering practices through various laboratory investigations. These investigations are executed using hands-on investigations, group and individual projects, reading selections, and research to support active engagement in learning. Students will interact with informational text, add pertinent vocabulary, and perform investigations in which they ask questions and construct and justify their solutions to problems.

     

    At the conclusion of third grade, students will be able to test predictions, analyze and interpret data, and communicate their results. Students will also gain the knowledge, hands-on experiences, and confidence to pose questions about the science that is present all around them.

     

    The four General Topics of the third grade curriculum include:

    • Properties and Changes in Matter
    • Energy Transfer – Electricity and Magnetism
    • Earth’s Materials and Resources
    • Environments and Habitats

     

    The following Overarching Concepts are an essential component to all units of instruction in third grade science:

     

    • Construct explanations
    • Construct scientific arguments
    • Develop, use, and refine models
    • Obtain and evaluate a variety of sources
    • Plan and conduct scientific investigations
    • Analyze and interpret data from a variety of sources
    • Obtain and evaluate a variety of sources

     

    3rd Grade Social Studies - Overarching Concepts

    Course Description

     

    The exceptional story of South Carolina is the focus of third grade social studies. Building upon the economic, geographic, political, and historical concepts learned in the primary grades, students will discover how a variety of cultural influences have interacted to create a unique and diverse society within our state. Students will begin to understand South Carolina’s influential role and place within the greater context of United States history. Students completing third grade social studies will then be prepared to build on their learning as they move to a study of United States history in the fourth and fifth grades.

    Instruction should utilize the social studies literacy skills for the twenty-first century. These statements represent a continuum of tools, strategies, and perspectives that are necessary for the student’s understanding of social studies material that is taught at each grade level. Beginning at kindergarten and progressing to graduation, each statement is a developmentally appropriate iteration of the same skill as it is being further honored at each grade band. While most of these skills can be utilized in the teaching of every standard, the most appropriate skills for each standard are repeated in a bulleted list at the bottom of the page for that particular standard.

     

    Course Overview/ Student Outcomes

     

    The following bulleted descriptors are the overarching concepts to be taught throughout the third grade year across the content area of South Carolina History:

     

    -The students will categorize the places and regions in South Carolina and the role of human systems in the state.

     

    -The students will be able to analyze, summarize, and sequence the explorations and settlements of South Carolina.

     

    -The students will be able to generalize the events of the American Revolution, and South Carolina's role in the development of the new American nation.

     

    -The students will be able to compare and contrast the of life in the antebellum period, identify the causes and effects of the Civil War, and summarize the impact of Reconstruction in South Carolina.

     

    -The students will be able to recognize the causes and effects of the major developments in South Carolina in the late nineteenth and the twentieth century.

     

    Profile of the SC Graduate Terminology

     

    The third grade South Carolina Social Studies State Standards support the profile of the South Carolina graduate. They promote the production of the world class skills of:

     

    -Creativity and Innovation

    -Critical Thinking and Problem Solving

    -Collaboration and Teamwork

    -Communication

    -Information

    -Media and Technology

    -Knowing How to Learn