Colorado Academic Standards Online

Students Can:

1. Engage effectively in a range of collaborative discussions (one-on-one, in groups, and teacher-led) with diverse partners on grade 3 topics and texts, building on others’ ideas and expressing their own clearly. (CCSS: SL 3.1)
   • Come to discussions prepared, having read or studied required material; explicitly draw on that preparation and other information known about the topic to explore ideas under discussion. (CCSS: SL.3.1a)
   • Follow agreed-upon rules for discussions (for example: gaining the floor in respectful ways, listening to others with care, speaking one at a time about the topics and texts under discussion). (CCSS: SL.3.1b)
   • Ask questions to check understanding of information presented, stay on topic, and link their comments to the remarks of others. (CCSS: SL.3.1c)
   • Explain their own ideas and understanding in light of the discussion. (CCSS: SL.3.1d)
2. Determine the main ideas and supporting details of a text read aloud or information presented in diverse media and formats, including visually, quantitatively, and orally. (CCSS: SL 3.2)
3. Ask and answer questions about information from a speaker, offering appropriate elaboration and detail. (CCSS: SL 3.3)

Students Can:

1. Report on a topic or text, tell a story, or recount an experience with appropriate facts and relevant, descriptive details, speaking clearly at an understandable pace. (CCSS: SL.3.4)
2. Distinguish different levels of formality.
3. Speak clearly, using appropriate volume and pitch for the purpose and audience.
4. Select and organize ideas sequentially or around major points of information that relate to the formality of the audience.
5. Create engaging audio recordings of stories or poems that demonstrate fluid reading at an understandable pace; add visual displays when appropriate to emphasize or enhance certain facts or details. (CCSS: SL.3.5)
6. Speak in complete sentences when appropriate to task and situation in order to provide requested detail or clarification. (CCSS: SL.3.6)

Students Can:

1. Use Key Ideas and Details to:
   • Ask and answer questions to demonstrate understanding of a text, referring explicitly to the text as the basis for the answers. (CCSS: RL.3.1) *
   • Use a variety of comprehension strategies to interpret text (attending, searching, predicting, checking, and self-correcting). *
   • Recount stories, including fables, folktales, and myths from diverse cultures; determine the central message, lesson, or moral and explain how it is conveyed through key details in the text. (CCSS: RL.3.2)
   • Summarize central ideas and important details from a text. *
   • Describe and draw inferences about the elements of plot, character, and setting in literary pieces, poems, and plays.
   • Describe characters in a story (for example: their traits, motivations, or feelings) and explain how their actions contribute to the sequence of events. (CCSS: RL.3.3)
2. Use Craft and Structure to:
   • Determine the meaning of words and phrases as they are used in a text, distinguishing literal from nonliteral language. (CCSS: RL.3.4)*
   • Use signal words (such as before, after, next) and text structure (narrative, chronology) to determine the sequence of major events
   • Refer to parts of stories, dramas, and poems when writing or speaking about a text, using terms such as chapter, scene, and stanza; describe how each successive part builds on earlier sections. (CCSS: RL.3.5)
   • Distinguish their own point of view from that of the narrator or those of the characters. (CCSS: RL.3.6)
3. Use Integration of Knowledge and Ideas to:
   • Explain how specific aspects of a text’s illustrations contribute to what is conveyed by the words in a story (for example: create mood, emphasize aspects of a character or setting). (CCSS: RL.3.7)
   • Compare and contrast the themes, settings, and plots of stories written by the same author about the same or similar characters (for example: in books from a series). (CCSS: RL.3.9) *
4. Use Range of Reading and Complexity of Text to:
   • By the end of the year, read and comprehend literature, including stories, dramas, and poetry, at the high end of the grades 2-3 text complexity band independently and proficiently. (CCSS: RL.3.10)
5. Read grade level text accurately and fluently, attending to phrasing, intonation, and punctuation. *

Students Can:

1. Use Key Ideas and Details to:
   • Ask and answer questions to demonstrate understanding of a text, referring explicitly to the text as the basis for the answers. (CCSS: RI.3.1) *
   • Determine the main idea of a text; recount the key details and explain how they support the main idea. (CCSS: RI.3.2) *
   • Identify a main topic of a multi-paragraph text as well as the focus of specific paragraphs within the text *
   • Describe the relationship between a series of historical events, scientific ideas or concepts, or steps in technical procedures in a text, using language that pertains to time, sequence, and cause/effect. (CCSS: RI.3.3) *
2. Use Craft and Structure to:
   • Determine the meaning of general academic and domain-specific words and phrases in a text relevant to a grade 3 topic or subject area. (CCSS: RI.3.4)
   • Use text features and search tools (for example: key words, sidebars, hyperlinks) to locate information relevant to a given topic efficiently. (CCSS: RI.3.5)
   • Distinguish their own point of view from that of the author of a text. (CCSS: RI.3.6)
   • Use semantic cues and signal words (for example: because and although) to identify cause/effect and compare/contrast relationships. *
3. Use Integration of Knowledge and Ideas to:
   • Use information gained from illustrations (for example: maps, photographs) and the words in a text to demonstrate understanding of the text (for example: where, when, why, and how key events occur). (CCSS: RI.3.7)
   • Describe the logical connection between particular sentences and paragraphs in a text (for example: comparison, cause/effect, first/second/third in a sequence). (CCSS: RI.3.8) *
   • Compare and contrast the most important points and key details presented in two texts on the same topic. (CCSS: RI.3.9) *
4. Use Range of Reading and Complexity of Text to:
   • By the end of the year, read and comprehend informational texts, including history/social studies, science, and technical texts, at the high end of the grades 2–3 text complexity band independently and proficiently. (CCSS: RI.3.10) *

Students Can:

1. Know and apply grade-level phonics and word analysis skills in decoding words. (CCSS: RF.3.3)
   • Identify and know the meaning of the most common prefixes and derivational suffixes. (CCSS: RF.3.3a) *
   • Decode words with common Latin suffixes. (CCSS: RF.3.3b) *
   • Decode multisyllable words. (CCSS: RF.3.3c) *
   • Read grade-appropriate irregularly spelled words. (CCSS: RF.3.3d) *
2. Read with sufficient accuracy and fluency to support comprehension. (CCSS: RF.3.4)
   • Read grade-level text with purpose and understanding. (CCSS.3.4a)
   • Read grade-level prose and poetry orally with accuracy, appropriate rate, and expression. (CCSS.3.4b)
   • Use context to confirm or self-correct word recognition and understanding, rereading as necessary. (CCSS.3.4c)
3. Determine or clarify the meaning of unknown and multiple-meaning word and phrases based on grade 3 reading and content, choosing flexibly from a range of strategies. (CCSS: L.3.4)
   • Use sentence-level context as a clue to the meaning of a word or phrase. (CCSS: L.3.4a) *
   • Determine the meaning of the new word formed when a known affix is added to a known word (for example: agreeable/disagreeable, comfortable/uncomfortable, care/careless, heat/preheat). (CCSS: L.3.4b) *
   • Use knowledge of word relationships to identify antonyms or synonyms to clarify meaning. *
   • Use a known root word as a clue to the meaning of an unknown word with the same root (for example: company, companion). (CCSS: L.3.4c) *
   • Use glossaries or beginning dictionaries, both print and digital, to determine or clarify the precise meaning of key words and phrases. (CCSS: L.3.4d)
   • Determine the meaning of general academic and domain-specific words and phrases in a text relevant to a grade 3 topic or subject area. *
4. Demonstrate understanding of figurative language, word relationships and nuances in word meanings. (CCSS: L.3.5)
   • Distinguish the literal and nonliteral meanings of words and phrases in context (for example: take steps). (CCSS: L.3.5a)
   • Identify real-life connections between words and their use (for example: describe people who are friendly or helpful). (CCSS: L.3.5b)
   • Distinguish shades of meaning among related words that describe states of mind or degrees of certainty (for example: knew, believed, suspected, heard, wondered). (CCSS: L.3.5c)
5. Acquire and use accurately grade-appropriate conversational, general academic, and domain-specific words and phrases, including those that signal spatial and temporal relationships (for example: After dinner that night we went looking for them). (CCSS: L.3.6)

Students Can:

1. Introduce the topic or text they are writing about, state an opinion, and create an organizational structure that includes reasons. (CCSS: W.3.1a)
2. Provide reasons that support the opinion. (CCSS: W.3.1b)
3. Use linking words and phrases (for example: because, therefore, since, for example) to connect opinion and reasons. (CCSS: W.3.1c)
4. Provide a concluding statement or section. (CCSS: W.3.1d)

Students Can:

1. Introduce a topic and group related information together; include illustrations when useful to aiding comprehension. (CCSS: W.3.2a)
2. Develop the topic with facts, definitions, and details. (CCSS: W.3.2b)
3. Use linking words and phrases (for example: also, another, and, more, but) to connect ideas within categories of information. (CCSS: W.3c)
4. Provide a concluding statement or section. (CCSS: W.3.2d)

Students Can:

1. Establish a situation and introduce a narrator and/or characters; organize an event sequence that unfolds naturally. (CCSS: W.3.3a)
2. Use dialogue and descriptions of actions, thoughts, and feelings to develop experiences and events or show the response of characters to situations. (CCSS: W.3.3b)
3. Use temporal words and phrases to signal event order. (CCSS: W.3c)
4. Provide a sense of closure. (CCSS: W.3.3d)

Students Can:

1. Demonstrate command of the conventions of Standard English grammar and usage when writing or speaking. (CCSS: L.3.1)
   • Explain the function of nouns, pronouns, verbs, adjectives, and adverbs in general and their functions in particular sentences. (CCSS: L.3.1a)
   • Use abstract nouns (for example: childhood). (CCSS: L.3.1c)
   • Form and use regular and irregular verbs. (CCSS: L.3.1d)
   • Form and use the simple (for example: I walked; I walk; I will walk) verb tenses. (CCSS: L.3.1e)
   • Ensure pronoun-antecedent agreement. (adapted from CCSS: L.3.1f)
   • Form and use comparative and superlative adjectives and adverbs, and choose between them depending on what is to be modified. (CCSS: L.3.1g)
   • Use coordinating and subordinating conjunctions. (CCSS: L.3.1h)
   • Produce simple, compound, and complex sentences using coordinating and subordinating conjunctions. (adapted from CCSS: L.3.1i)
   • Vary sentence beginnings, and use long and short sentences to create sentence fluency in longer texts
2. Demonstrate command of the conventions of Standard English capitalization, punctuation, and spelling when writing. (CCSS: L.3.2)
   • Capitalize appropriate words in titles. (CCSS: L.3.2a)
   • Use commas in addresses. (CCSS: L.3.2b)
   • Use commas and quotation marks in dialogue. (CCSS: L.3.2c)
   • Form and use possessives. (CCSS: L.3.2d)
   • Use conventional spelling for high-frequency and other studied words and for adding suffixes to base words (for example: sitting, smiled, cries, happiness). (CCSS: L.3.2e)
   • Use spelling patterns and generalizations (for example: word families, position-based spellings, syllable patterns, ending rules, meaningful word parts) in writing words. (CCSS: L.3.2f)
   • Consult reference materials, including beginning dictionaries, as needed to check and correct spellings. (CCSS: L.3.2g)
3. Use knowledge of language and its conventions when writing, speaking, reading, or listening. (CCSS: L.3.3)
   • Choose words and phrases for effect. (CCSS: L.3.3a)
   • Recognize and observe differences between the conventions of spoken and written standard English. (CCSS: L.3.3b)
4. With guidance and support from adults, produce writing in which the development and organization are appropriate to task and purpose. (CCSS: W.3.4)
5. With guidance and support from peers and adults, develop and strengthen writing as needed by planning, revising, and editing. (CCSS: W.3.5)
6. With guidance and support from adults, use technology to produce and publish writing (using keyboarding skills) as well as to interact and collaborate with others. (CCSS: W.3.6)
7. Write routinely over extended time frames (time for research, reflection, and revision) and shorter time frames (a single sitting or a day or two) for a range of discipline-specific tasks, purposes, and audiences. (CCSS.W.3.10)

Students Can:

1. Conduct short research projects that build knowledge about a topic. (CCSS: W.3.7)
2. Interpret and communicate the information learned by developing a brief summary with supporting details.
3. Develop supporting visual information (for example: charts, maps, illustrations, models).
4. Present a brief report of the research findings to an audience.
5. Recall information from experiences or gather information from print and digital sources; take brief notes on sources and sort evidence into provided categories. (CCSS: W.3.8)

Students Can:

1. Participate in collaborative conversations with diverse partners about kindergarten topics and texts with peers and adults in small and larger groups. (CCSS: SL.K.1)*
   • Follow agreed-upon rules for discussions (for example: listening to others and taking turns speaking about the topics and texts under discussion). (CCSS: SL.K.1a)
   • Continue a conversation through multiple exchanges. (CCSS: SL.K.1b)
2. Confirm understanding of a text read aloud or information presented orally or through other media by asking and answering questions about key details and requesting clarification if something is not understood. (CCSS: SL.K.2) *
3. Ask and answer questions in order to seek help, get information, or clarify something that is not understood. (CCSS: SL.K.3) *
4. Listen with comprehension to follow two-step directions. *
5. Use words and phrases acquired through conversations, reading and being read to, and responding to texts. (CCSS: L.K.6) *

Students Can:

1. Describe familiar people, places, things, and events and, with prompting and support, provide additional detail. (CCSS: SL.K.4)
2. Add drawings or other visual displays to descriptions as desired to provide additional detail. (CCSS: SL.K.5)
3. Speak audibly and express thoughts, feelings, and ideas clearly. (CCSS: SL.K.6)
4. Sort common objects into categories (for example: shapes, foods) to gain a sense of the concepts the categories represent. (CCSS: L.K.5a)
5. Demonstrate understanding of frequently occurring verbs and adjectives by relating them to their opposites (antonyms). (CCSS: L.K.5b)
6. Identify real-life connections between words and their use (for example: note places at school that are colorful). (CCSS: L.K.5c)
7. Distinguish shades of meaning among verbs describing the same general action (for example: walk, march, strut, prance) by acting out the meanings. (CCSS: L.K.5d)
8. Use new vocabulary that is directly taught through reading, speaking, and listening. *
9. Relate new vocabulary to prior knowledge. *

Students Can:

1. Use Key Ideas and Details to:
   • With prompting and support, ask and answer questions about key details in a text. (CCSS: RL.K.1) *
   • With prompting and support, retell familiar stories, including key details. (CCSS: RL.K.2)
   • With prompting and support, identify characters, settings, and major events in a story. (CCSS: RL.K.3) *
2. Use Craft and Structure to:
   • Ask and answer questions about unknown words in a text. (CCSS: RL.K.4)
   • Recognize common types of texts (for example: storybooks, poems). (CCSS: RL.K.5) *
   • With prompting and support, name the author and illustrator of a story and define the role of each in telling the story. (CCSS: RL.K.6)
3. Use Integration of Knowledge and Ideas to:
   • With prompting and support, describe the relationship between illustrations and the story in which they appear (for example: what moment in a story an illustration depicts). (CCSS: RL.K.7)
   • With prompting and support, compare and contrast the adventures and experiences of characters in familiar stories. (CCSS: RL.K.9)
4. Use Range of Reading and Level of Text Complexity to:
   • Actively engage in group reading activities with purpose and understanding. (CCSS: RL.K.10)

Students Can:

1. Use Key Ideas and Details to:
   • With prompting and support, ask and answer questions about key details in a text. (CCSS: RI.K.1) *
   • With prompting and support, identify the main topic and retell key details of a text. (CCSS: RI.K.2)
   • With prompting and support, describe the connection between two individuals, events, ideas, or pieces of information in a text. (CCSS: RI.K.3)
2. Use Craft and Structure to:
   • With prompting and support, ask and answer questions about unknown words in a text. (CCSS: RI.K.4)
   • Identify the front cover, back cover, and title page of a book. (CCSS: RI.K.5) *
   • Name the author and illustrator of a text and define the role of each in presenting the ideas or information in a text. (CCSS: RI.K.6)
3. Use Integration of Knowledge and Ideas to:
   • With prompting and support, describe the relationship between illustrations and the text in which they appear (for example: what person, place, thing, or idea in the text an illustration depicts). (CCSS: RI.K.7)
   • With prompting and support, identify the reasons an author gives to support points in a text. (CCSS: RI.K.8)
   • With prompting and support, identify basic similarities in and differences between two texts on the same topic (for example: in illustrations, descriptions, or procedures). (CCSS: RI.K.9)
4. Use Range of Reading and Level of Text Complexity to:
   • Actively engage in group reading activities with purpose and understanding. (CCSS: RI.K.10)

Students Can:

1. Demonstrate understanding of the organization and basic features of print. (CCSS: RF.K.1) *
   • Follow words from left to right, top to bottom, and page by page. (CCSS: RF.K.1a)
   • Recognize that spoken words are represented in written language by specific sequences of letters. (CCSS: RF.K.1b) *
   • Understand that words are separated by spaces in print (concept of word). (CCSS: RF.K.1c) *
   • Recognize and name all upper- and lowercase letters of the alphabet. (CCSS: RF.K.1d)*
2. Demonstrate understanding of spoken words, syllables, and sounds (phonemes). (CCSS: RF.K.2)
   • Recognize and produce rhyming words. (CCSS: RF.K.2a) *
   • Count, pronounce, blend, and segment syllables in spoken words. (CCSS: RF.K.2b) *
   • Blend and segment the onset and rime of single-syllable spoken words. (adapted from CCSS: RF.K.2c) *
   • Isolate and pronounce the initial, medial vowel, and final sounds (phonemes) in three-phoneme (consonant-vowel-consonant, or CVC) words. (adapted from CCSS: RF.K.2d) *
   • Add or substitute individual sounds (phonemes) in simple, one-syllable words to make new words. (CCSS: RF.K.2e) *
   • Read text consisting of short sentences comprised of learned sight words and consonant-vowel-consonant (CVC) words. *
   • Identify phonemes for letters. *
3. Know and apply grade-level phonics and word analysis skills in decoding words. (CCSS: RF.K3)
   • Demonstrate basic knowledge of letter-sound correspondences by producing the primary or most frequent sound for each consonant. (adapted from CCSS: RF.K.3a) *
   • Associate the long and short sounds with the common spellings (graphemes) for the five major vowels. (CCSS: RF.K.3b) *
   • Read common high-frequency words by sight (for example: the, of, to, you, she, my, is, are, do, does). (CCSS: RF.K.3c)
   • Distinguish between similarly spelled words by identifying the sounds of the letters that differ. (CCSS: RF.K.3d) *
4. Read emergent-reader texts with purpose and understanding. (CCSS: RF.K.4)
5. Determine or clarify the meaning of unknown and multiple-meaning words and phrases based on kindergarten reading and content. (CCSS: L.K.4)
   • Identify new meanings for familiar words and apply them accurately (for example: knowing duck is a bird and learning the verb to duck). (CCSS: L.K.4a) *
   • Use the most frequently occurring inflections and affixes (for example: -ed,-s, re-, un-, pre-, -ful, -less) as a clue to the meaning of an unknown word. (CCSS: L.K.4b) *
6. Identify and manipulate sounds.
   • Identify and produce groups of words that begin with the same sound (alliteration). *
   • Identify the initial, medial, and final phoneme (speech sound) of spoken words. *

Students Can:

1. Use a combination of drawing, dictating, and writing to compose opinion pieces in which they tell a reader the topic or the name of the book they are writing about and state an opinion or preference about the topic or book (for example: My favorite book is...). (CCSS: W.K.1)
2. With guidance and support from adults, respond to questions and suggestions from peers and add details to strengthen writing as needed. (CCSS: W.K.5)
3. With guidance and support from adults, explore a variety of digital tools to produce and publish writing, including in collaboration with peers. (CCSS: W.K.6)

Students Can:

1. Use a combination of drawing, dictating, and writing to compose informative/explanatory texts in which they name what they are writing about and supply some information about the topic. (CCSS: W.K.2)
2. With guidance and support from adults, respond to questions and suggestions from peers and add details to strengthen writing as needed. (CCSS: W.K.5)
3. With guidance and support from adults, explore a variety of digital tools to produce and publish writing, including in collaboration with peers. (CCSS: W.K.6)

Students Can:

1. Use a combination of drawing, dictating, and writing to narrate a single event or several loosely linked events, tell about the events in the order in which they occurred, and provide a reaction to what happened. (CCSS: W.K.3)
2. With guidance and support from adults, respond to questions and suggestions from peers and add details to strengthen writing as needed. (CCSS: W.K.5)
3. With guidance and support from adults, explore a variety of digital tools to produce and publish writing, including in collaboration with peers. (CCSS: W.K.6)

Students Can:

1. Demonstrate command of the conventions of Standard English grammar and usage when writing or speaking. (CCSS: L.K.1)
   • Print many upper- and lowercase letters. (CCSS: L.K.1a)
   • Use frequently occurring nouns and verbs. (CCSS: L.K.1b)
   • Form regular plural nouns orally by adding /s/ or /es/ (for example: dog, dogs; wish, wishes). (CCSS: L.K.1c)
   • Understand and use question words (interrogatives) (for example: who, what, where, when, why, how). (CCSS: L.K.1d)
   • Use the most frequently occurring prepositions (for example: to, from, in, out, on, off, for, of, by, with). (CCSS: L.K.1e)
   • Produce and expand complete sentences in shared language activities. (CCSS: L.K.1f)
2. Demonstrate command of the conventions of Standard English capitalization, punctuation, and spelling when writing. (CCSS: L.K.2)
   • Capitalize the first word in a sentence and the pronoun I. (CCSS: L.K.2a)
   • Recognize and name end punctuation. (CCSS: L.K.2b)
   • Write a letter or letters for most consonant and short-vowel sounds (phonemes). (CCSS: L.K.2c)
   • Spell simple words phonetically, drawing on knowledge of sound-letter relationships. (CCSS: L.K.2d)

Students Can:

1. Participate in shared research and writing projects (for example: explore a number of books by a favorite author and express opinions about them). (CCSS:W.K.7)
2. Identify a clear purpose for research or inquiry (for example: If the class is learning about trees, is my need to know more about pets related?).
3. Ask a specific question and gather relevant information from various sources related to that question that inform clarity of purpose and conclusions about research.
4. Ask primary questions of clarity, significance, relevance, and accuracy to improve quality of thinking.
5. Use a variety of resources to answer questions of interest through guided inquiry (for example: texts read aloud or viewed, direct observation).
6. Gather relevant information and check various information sources for accuracy (for example: In a class discussion focused on butterflies, students ask questions related to a butterfly and the life cycle.).
7. With guidance and support from adults, recall information from experience or gather information from provided sources to answer a question. (CCSS:W.K.8)