Third Grade - Science Indicators

Earth and Space Sciences 

Earth Systems
  • Compare and distinct properties of rocks (e.g., color, layering and texture).
  • Observe and investigate that rocks are often found in layers.
  • Describe that smaller rocks come from the breakdown of larger rocks through the actions of plants and weather.
  • Observe and describe the composition of soil (e.g., small pieces of rock and decomposed pieces of plants and animals, and products of plants and animals).
  • Investigate the properties of soil (e.g., color, texture, capacity to retain water, ability to support plant growth).
  • Investigate that soils are often found in layers and can be different from place to place.

Life Sciences

Heredity Compare the life cycles of different animals including birth to adulthood, reproduction and death (e.g., egg-tadpole-frog, egg-caterpillar-chrysalis-butterfly).
Diversity and Interdependency of Life
  • Relate animal structures to their specific survival functions (e.g., obtaining food, escaping or hiding from enemies).
  • Classify animals according to their characteristics (e.g., body coverings and body structure).
  • Use examples to explain that extinct organisms may resemble organisms that are alive today.
  • Observe and explore how fossils provide evidence about animals that lived long ago and the nature of the environment at that time.
  • Describe how changes in an organism's habitat are sometimes beneficial and sometimes harmful.

Physical Sciences 

Forces and Motion
  • Describe an objects position by locating it relative to another object or the background.
  • Describe an objects motion by tracing and measuring its position over time.
  • Identify contact/non-contact forces that affect motion of an object (e.g., gravity, magnetism and collision).
  • Predict the changes when an object experiences a force (e.g., a push or pull, weight and friction).

Science and Technology 

Understanding Technology
  • Describe how technology can extend human abilities (e.g., to move things and to extend senses).
  • Describe ways that using technology can have helpful and/or harmful results.
  • Investigate ways that the results of technology may affect the individual, family and community.
Abilities to Do Technological Design
  • Use a simple design process to solve a problem (e.g., identify a problem, identify possible solutions and design a solution).
  • Describe possible solutions to a design problem (e.g., how to hold down paper in the wind).

Scientific Inquiry 

Doing Scientific Inquiry
  • Select the appropriate tools and use relevant safety procedures to measure and record length and weight in metric and English units.
  • Discuss observations and measurements made by other people. 
  • Read and interpret simple tables and graphs produced by self/others.
  • Identify and apply science safety procedures.
  • Record and organize observations (e.g., journals, charts and tables).
  • Communicate scientific findings to others through a variety of methods (e.g., pictures, written, oral and recorded observations).

Scientific Ways of Knowing 

Nature of Science Describe different kinds of investigations that scientists use depending on the questions they are trying to answer.
Ethical Practices Keeping records of investigations and observations and do not change the records that are different from someone else's work.
Science and Society
  • Explore through stories how men and women have contributed to the development of science.
  • Identify various careers in science.
  • Discuss how both men and women find science rewarding as a career and in their everyday lives.

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