English Language Arts Grade 3
Educational Links

Writing Standard 2

Write informative/explanatory texts to examine a topic and convey ideas and information clearly.

• Balancing Three Branches at Once
  This page contains 4 EDSITEment lessons in which students use primary source documents to investigate of how the three branches of the American government can check each other.
• Can You Convince Me?: Persuasive Writing
  In this ReadWriteThink lesson, students are introduced to the basic concepts of lobbying for something that is important to them and making persuasive arguments. Through a classroom game and resource handouts, students become aware of the techniques used in persuasive oral arguments and apply them to independent persuasive writing activities.
• Dear Librarian: Writing a Persuasive Letter
  Students will develop and support a position on a particular book by writing a persuasive letter about their chosen title; use a guide to help them organize their persuasive ideas into written form; outline a persuasive piece that expresses points in a clear, logical sequence so the reader can follow their reasoning; publish their persuasive piece as a letter.
• Declare the Causes:The Declaration of Independence
  This unit from EDSITEment capitalizes on the propensity to complain to increase student awareness of the precedents behind the Declaration of Independence. By the completion of this unit, students will be able to describe and list the sections of the Declaration of Independence and explain the basic purpose of each. They will also be able to give an example of a document that served as a precedent for the Declaration, list and explain one or more of the colonists' complaints included in the Declaration, and demonstrate an awareness of the Declaration of Independence as a historical process developed in protest of unfair conditions.
• Fables and Trickster Tales Around the World
  This lesson plan from EDSITEment introduces students to folktales, such as fables and trickster tales, from around the world. Students become familiar with different folklore traditions and genres, as well as the process of the oral transmission of culture and history. This lesson plan comprises a series of activities that include reading, writing, and literary analysis. Also included is an internet research activity, as well as a list of links to related resources.
• Go West: Imagining the Oregon Trail
  After this lesson, students will have learned about the pioneer experience on the Oregon Trail,compared and contrasted modern-day travel experiences with travel experiences of the 19th century, and synthesized historical data through creative writing.
• It Came From Greek Mythology
  This page contains 6 EDSITEment lessons based around teaching Greek mythology. Students will study basic plots of three Greek myths and discuss three types of themes in Greek myths. They will also explore contemporary uses of terms from Greek mythology and analyze artistic and literary works based on or inspired by Greek myths.
• The Preamble to the Constitution: How Do You Make
  This page contains 5 EDSITEment lessons in which students investigate the purposes of the U.S. Constitution, as identified in the Preamble to the Constitution, and study fundamental values and principles as they are expressed in the Preamble to the U.S. Constitution.
• Third Grade On-Demand Informative / Explanatory Writing Samples
  Sample informative / explanatory pieces written by third graders in response to a uniform text-based prompt.
• Third Grade Range of Writing Informative / Explanatory Writing Samples
  These pieces provide examples of informative / explanatory writing for a range of discipline-specific tasks, purposes, and audiences, over both extended and shorter time frames.

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http://www.uen.org - in partnership with Utah State Board of Education (USBE) and Utah System of Higher Education (USHE).  Send questions or comments to USBE Specialist - Sara  Wiebke and see the Language Arts - Elementary website. For general questions about Utah's Core Standards contact the Director - Jennifer  Throndsen.

These materials have been produced by and for the teachers of the State of Utah. Copies of these materials may be freely reproduced for teacher and classroom use. When distributing these materials, credit should be given to Utah State Board of Education. These materials may not be published, in whole or part, or in any other format, without the written permission of the Utah State Board of Education, 250 East 500 South, PO Box 144200, Salt Lake City, Utah 84114-4200.