Grade 3 Lesson plan
Where Ollerton's Sink Water Goes: A Grade 3 Wastewater Lesson
A 45-minute grade 3 lesson tracing used water from a school sink to a made-up town's cleaning plant, with criteria, limits, and minute-level tank times.
Common Core Math · Grade 3
3.MD.A.1 Solve time-interval word problems to the minute
Tell and write time to the nearest minute and measure time intervals in minutes. Solve word problems involving addition and subtraction of time intervals in minutes, e.g., by representing the problem on a number line diagram.
Why water teaches this standard well
Students time how many minutes it takes to fill a bucket at a drinking fountain, then find the difference in fill time between a fast and a slow fountain using a number line. Minute-level timing is the same skill behind timing a filter backwash cycle at a treatment plant.
Materials tagged with this code are written to the full standard , and each carries a written note explaining the alignment. See how we review materials.
9 materials aligned to 3.MD.A.1
Lesson plans
Grade 3 Lesson plan
Meadowlark Pump Station Timing: A Grade 3 Minutes Lesson
A 45-minute grade 3 lesson where students find elapsed time to the minute on a number line as pumps fill a tank at a fictional pump station.
Grade 3 Lesson plan
Foxglove Elementary's Fountain Fill-Time: An Elapsed-Time Lesson
A grade 3 lesson where students use start and end times to find how long fountains take to fill Field Day coolers, using a number line.
Worksheets
Grade 3 Worksheet
Water Break Times at Cricket Hollow Day Camp
A grade 3 worksheet where students read a fictional day camp schedule and solve elapsed-time problems in minutes about the camp's three daily water breaks.
Grade 3 Worksheet
Pebble Lane's Storm Drain Route: A Grade 3 Elapsed Time Worksheet
Students read a fictional storm crew's morning log of start and stop times, then find how many minutes the crew spent at each catch basin and on the whole route.
Grade 3 Worksheet
Wickersham Plant's Morning Check Route: A Grade 3 Time Worksheet
A grade 3 worksheet where students find finish times, gaps, and totals for the five stops on a fictional water plant operator's morning check route.
Math problem sets
Grade 3 Math problem set
Skellingate Dam's Wheel Week: A Grade 3 Two-Step Problem Set
Ten grade 3 problems tracking one week at a fictional dam, mixing two-step multiplication and subtraction with clock-time intervals from the crew's log.
Labs & experiments
Grade 3 Lab / experiment
The Settling Jar Test at Cloverstock Creek: A Grade 3 Lab
A grade 3 lab in which teams shake three jars holding sand, garden soil, and potting mix, then score how fast each one clears at five, ten, and twenty minutes.
Classroom activities
Grade 3 Classroom activity
Hazelford Pump House Shift Checks: A Grade 3 Time Relay
A 40-minute grade 3 relay where teams read clock cards from a fictional pump house shift log and find how many minutes each equipment check lasted.