3rd Grade - Gateway 1

The instructional materials reviewed for Zearn Grade 3 meet the expectations for assessing grade-level content and, if applicable, content from earlier grades.

• Zearn has two components to the program: Independent Digital Lessons and Teacher-Led Instruction. The summative assessments are located in the Teacher-Led Instruction section of the program.
• The summative assessments in each Mission, except Mission 6, include a Mid-Module and End-of-Module assessment. In Mission 6 there is an End-of-Module assessment.
• Each assessment question has been linked to one or more of the standards which are specified in the rubric.

The instructional materials focus on grade-level content.

• Mission 3: Students solve multiplication and division problems with a variety of strategies, including arrays and number bonds (3.OA.7).
• Mission 5: Students represent fractions on a number line (3.NF.2) and partition whole numbers into equal parts using rectangles (3.NF.2b).
• Mission 6: Students gather information using a pictograph (3.MD.3) and create and label a bar graph (3.MD.3).

The instructional materials reviewed for Zearn Grade 3 meet the expectation for spending the majority of class time on the major clusters of the grade. For Grade 3 this includes all clusters within 3.OA. and 3.NF, along with 3.MD.A and 3.MD.C.

According to Missions and Standards Overview for Grade 3, the materials contain 7 Missions, 129 Lessons, and 36 Weeks, with 4 lessons per week.

• 5 of the 7 Missions include one or more major clusters of Grade 3. Approximately 71 percent of the Missions focus on major work of the grade.
• Approximately 30 of the 36 Weeks of instruction are spent on major work of Grade 3, or 84 percent of the year.
• There are a total of 129 Lessons, and approximately 107 Lessons focus on the major work of Grade 3 (or 83 percent of the Lessons).

The most representative perspective for this indicator is Weeks, with Zearn spending approximately 84 percent of instructional time on the major work of the grade.

The instructional materials reviewed for Zearn Grade 3 meet expectations for the supporting content enhancing focus and coherence simultaneously by engaging students in the major work of the grade.

During Independent Digital Lessons students develop fluency in Number Gyms and Blasts, engage in guided practice in Math Chats, and do independent practice in the Tower of Power sections of the lessons. In Teacher-Led Instruction teachers present Whole Group Fluency, Small Group Lessons, and Whole Group Word Problems to engage students with content. In both the Independent Digital Lessons and Teacher-Led Instruction students have multiple opportunities to engage with supporting standards connected to the major work of the grade.

• In Mission 5 students partition shapes, supporting standard 3.G.2, to understand the parts of a whole are fractions, major cluster 3.NF.A.
• In Mission 6, Lessons 2, 3, and 4 focus on supporting standards 3.MD.3 and 3.MD.4 in connection to major standard 3.OA.1. Students represent and analyze data from tape diagrams, bar graphs, and graphs to connect data in one representation to multiple representations in pictographs. Students need to use multiplication to determine the total amounts in the different representations.

The instructional materials reviewed for Zearn Grade 3 meet the expectation for having an amount of content that is viable for one school year in order to foster coherence between grades.

The Independent Digital Lessons are broken up into four main components: Fluency, Guided Practice, Independent Practice, and Bonus. The components have different titles depending on the lesson and how the student is progressing through the program. The Teacher-Led Instruction is broken into six sections: Whole Group Fluency, Small Group Lessons, Whole Group Word Problems, Optional Homework, Assessments, and Whole Group Problem Sets.

The suggested time frame for completing the 129 Independent Digital Lessons and Teacher-Led Instruction is approximately 36 weeks. This provides material for 180 days. A typical day consists of 15 minutes of Whole Group Fluency and Word Problems, 30 minutes of individual digital content and 30 minutes of small-group, direct teacher instruction. There are also 13 summative assessments in the Zearn program. If needed, additional lessons are available in Mission 7.

The instructional materials reviewed for Zearn Grade 3 meet the expectations for being consistent with the progressions in the Standards.

The materials identify and explicitly connect grade-level work to prior or future grades. Users of the materials will find these connections throughout the materials. The materials give all students extensive work with grade-level problems. The following are places that demonstrate the progressions of the Standards and the connections from grade to grade:

• Each Mission has a Summary. This Summary explains how the lessons work through the progression of Grade 3 and make applicable connections to past or future content. For example, the Mission 5 Summary states: “This module builds deep understanding of fractions as a single number. Students begin concretely interacting with fractions by folding strips of paper to create equal parts, and end with the ability to evaluate equivalence and compare size pictorially.”
• On the teacher home page for Missions there is a box titled, "Foundational Digital Lessons.” This identifies what concepts from previous Topics and Lessons are connected to the current Topic. For example, Grade 3, Mission 3 provides links to Grade 2, Mission 6 (G2M6) and Grade 3, Mission 1 (G1M6) as Foundational Digital Lessons.
• In early Missions, the Whole Group Fluency link identifies essential skills from previous grades on which the Topic builds. For example, in Mission 2, Whole Group Fluency, Topic A, Lesson 1 Tell Time on the Clock, the teacher materials state the following: “This activity reviews the Grade 2 standard of telling and writing time to the nearest 5 minutes. It prepares students to count by 5-minute intervals on the number line and clock in Lesson 2.“
• Students have extensive work with practice problems. Students have daily fluency practice, guided practice, and independent practice when using the Independent Digital Lessons and when working in Teacher-Led Instruction with the teacher.

Overall, Lesson Summaries identify and explain connections between previous grade level, current grade level, and future content including the Lesson, Mission, and/or grade where the content appears.

The instructional materials reviewed for Zearn Grade 3 meet the expectations for fostering coherence through connections at a single grade.

Materials include learning objectives that are visibly shaped by CCSSM cluster headings.

• Mission 3, Small Group Lessons, Topic A, The Properties of Multiplication and Division, is visibly shaped by 3.OA.B: “Understand properties of multiplication and the relationship between multiplication and division.”
• Mission 5, Fractions as Numbers, is visibly shaped by 3.NF.A: “Develop understanding of fractions as numbers.”

Materials include problems and activities that sometimes serve to connect two or more clusters in a domain, or two or more domains where connections are natural and important.

• Mission 1 connects 3.OA.A, 3.OA.B, and 3.OA.C. For example, in Small Group Lesson 5 students solve the following problem: “Cynthia plans to buy 15 burgers. Three burgers come in each pack. How many packs should she buy?” Throughout the Mission students work with number bonds, drawings, arrays, counters, and tape diagrams to represent and solve problems involving properties of multiplication and division highlighting the relationship between multiplication and division all within 100.
• In Mission 3, Topic F, “students multiply by multiples of 10.” Students concentrate on place value understanding and use place value charts connecting 3.NBT.A and 3.OA.B.
• Mission 6 combines 3.MD.B and 3.OA.C. The program does not make note of this connection, but it does happen naturally as students use multiplication to create graphs with a scale greater than 1.