Grade 3 Science Chapter 3 | Practice Workbook

Grade 3 Science: Practice and Assessment

Download the printable and fillable practice workbook | Student text | Teacher guide

Use real observations and label models. Online answers are not saved or submitted. Save the PDF in a compatible PDF reader or print it to keep work. Do not enter private identifying information.

Lesson 1: Life Cycles and Living Things

Study a familiar flowering plant or a reliable picture with an adult. Look for leaves, flowers or seeds. Draw what you actually see. Do not eat unknown plants or disturb wildlife. A drawing of stages is a model, not a record that you observed every stage.

1. What does a life cycle describe?

2. Can different organisms have different life cycles?

3. Name a possible early stage of a flowering plant.

4. What can some adult flowering plants produce?

5. Must an individual reproduce to be alive?

6. Record one actual observation or say you used a picture.

Advanced extension: Explain why a picture of a life cycle is a model rather than proof that you observed every stage.

Lesson 2: Flowering Plant Stages

With an adult, place a bean seed in a clear cup with a damp paper towel. Observe daily if possible. Keep the towel damp, not flooded. Do not taste the seed. Record dates and actual changes. If no seed is available, label your stage drawing as a model.

1. What can a seed do under suitable conditions?

2. What is a young plant called?

3. What can an adult bean plant produce?

4. Will every seed necessarily germinate?

5. Record one actual observation or state that your drawing is a model.

6. Why record observation dates?

Advanced extension: Suggest one question you could investigate about seed growth and one condition to keep the same.

Lesson 3: Frog and Butterfly Life Cycles

Use a reliable book or adult-approved image of a frog and a butterfly. Make a labeled model of each life cycle. Do not collect animals or disturb eggs. Models show a general sequence; real timing and survival vary.

1. What hatches from a butterfly egg?

2. What stage follows the caterpillar?

3. What emerges from the chrysalis?

4. What hatches from a frog egg?

5. Name one way the two cycles differ.

6. Does every individual necessarily survive each stage?

Advanced extension: Compare the two models and explain why exact timing cannot be inferred from the diagrams alone.

Lesson 4: Inherited Traits and Variation

Compare two leaves from the ground or two pictures of the same kind of plant with an adult. Describe shapes and sizes. Do not pick unknown plants. Do not infer parentage or the cause of a difference from a picture alone.

1. What is a trait?

2. Do offspring often resemble their parents?

3. Are offspring always identical to parents?

4. Can individuals of the same kind vary?

5. Name one feature you can compare in leaves.

6. Can one picture prove why a leaf is larger?

Advanced extension: Describe how you could compare several similar plants while keeping some growing conditions consistent.

Lesson 5: Environment and Evidence

Plan a comparison of two groups of similar bean seedlings. Change the amount of light. Keep the type of plant, soil, container and water as similar as practical. Record actual height measurements and dates if you do the investigation. Do not invent data.

1. What factor changes in the plan?

2. Name two conditions to keep similar.

3. What can be measured?

4. Why record dates?

5. Does the plan itself prove what will happen?

6. Why use more than one plant in each group?

Advanced extension: Explain one limitation that might remain even if the plan is followed.

Independent Chapter Check

Use what you learned. A model is not an observation; record actual results only.

1. Name an early stage of a flowering plant.

2. Name the butterfly stage after caterpillar.

3. What is a tadpole associated with in this chapter?

4. Do all individuals survive to reproduce?

5. What is a trait?

6. Are offspring always identical to their parents?

7. In a fair light comparison, name one condition to keep similar.

8. Why should experimental observations not be invented?