Dino News!

Learning Resource Type

Classroom Resource

Subject Area

English Language Arts
Science

Grade(s)

3

Overview

The teacher will present an informational text from the website, ReadWorks. The students and teacher can interact with this non-fiction text by annotating the text digitally. The students will answer the questions associated with the article as an assessment. This learning activity can be used to explain that fossils can provide evidence about past environments and organisms. 

English Language Arts (2021) Grade(s): 3

ELA21.3.18

Demonstrate content knowledge built during independent reading of informational and literary texts by participating in content-specific discussions with peers and/or through writing.

UP:ELA21.3.18

Vocabulary

  • Demonstrate
  • Content knowledge
  • Independent reading
  • Informational text
  • Literary text
  • Content-specific discussions

Knowledge

Students know:
  • Content knowledge is information learned about a specific subject.
  • Content knowledge can be learned by independently reading text.
  • Informational text is nonfiction text, and literary text is fictional.
  • Active listening skills.
  • Writing skills.

Skills

Students are able to:
  • Build content knowledge from independently reading informational or literary text.
  • Use content knowledge learned from independent reading in content-specific discussions with peers.
  • Use content knowledge learned from independent reading in writing.

Understanding

Students understand that:
  • Content-specific discussions with peers can demonstrate the content knowledge they learned through independent reading.
  • They can produce writings that demonstrate knowledge of content-specific information.
Science (2015) Grade(s): 3

SC15.3.9

Analyze and interpret data from fossils (e.g., type, size, distribution) to provide evidence of organisms and the environments in which they lived long ago (e.g., marine fossils on dry land, tropical plant fossils in arctic areas, fossils of extinct organisms in any environment).

UP:SC15.3.9

Vocabulary

  • Analyze
  • Interpret
  • Data
  • Fossils
  • Type (mold fossils, cast fossils, trace fossils, true form fossils)
  • Size
  • Distribution
  • Evidence
  • Organisms
  • Environment
  • Extinct
  • Relationships

Knowledge

Students know:
  • That fossils represent plants and animals that lived long ago.
  • The relationships between the fossils of organisms and the environments in which they lived.
  • The relationships between types of fossils and the current environments where similar organisms are found.
  • That some fossil represent organisms that lived long ago and have no modern counterparts.
  • The relationships between fossils of organisms that lived long ago and their modern counterparts.
  • The relationships between existing animals and the environments in which they currently live.

Skills

Students are able to:
  • Organize data about fossils of animals and plants.
  • Identify and describe relationships in the data to make sense of fossils.
  • Interpret data to make sense of fossils.
  • Provide evidence based on data from fossils.

Understanding

Students understand that:
  • Fossils provide evidence of organisms that lived long ago.
  • Features of fossils provide evidence of organisms that lived long ago and of what types of environments those organisms must have lived in.
  • Science assumes consistent patterns in natural systems (based on relationships found in the data).
  • Environments can look very different now than they did a long time ago.

Scientific and Engineering Practices

Analyzing and Interpreting Data

Crosscutting Concepts

Scale, Proportion, and Quantity
ELA21.3.18

CR Resource Type

Learning Activity

Resource Provider

ReadWorks.org

License Type

Custom
https://www.readworks.org/article/Dino-News!/bdaab82e-f99b-47cb-a899-95abab7dc5…

Custom License Type (URL)

https://about.readworks.org/terms-of-use.html

Accessibility

Audio resources: includes a transcript or subtitles
Text Resources: Content is organized under headings and subheadings

Comments or Notes

ReadWorks is a website that provides K-12 teachers with free literacy resources (About ReadWorks). ReadWorks has literary and informational texts on a variety of subjects and reading skills. You may narrow your search using grade level or Lexile level, making this website a wonderful tool for differentiation. Students will complete their work digitally, and you will provide their score and feedback digitally. This makes it easy to go paperless for this activity.

Prior to implementing this activity, you will need to sign up for an Educator Account on ReadWorks. After setting up an account, create a class from the Class Admin tab, this will provide you with a Class Code to give to students. Next, use the Find Content tab to search for the informational article that will be used during this activity, "Dino News!" After navigating to the article, click on the blue Assign button to assign it to your class.

Each student will need access to a digital device, such as a tablet or laptop. The first time students enter the website they will need to enter the Class Code that is listed on your Class Admin page. Alternatively, you can print the article and corresponding questions for students, if digital devices are not available. The teacher could also complete this activity by projecting the article and questions for the whole class to view.

Approved Date

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