Grade 3 Fall History - Local History and Landmarks: The Stories of THIS Place
Lesson 3 50 min hist.g3.f.lesson_03

Eras and Decades - Deepening Our Timeline

Skills targeted
Objectives
  • Students apply era, century, and decade vocabulary to the local timeline.
  • Students sort 10 events into 4 named local eras.
Vocabulary
eracenturydecadeepochperiodcentury-mark

Lesson plan

Warm-up

5 min

Recite Place Promise (introduced next lesson preview). Math warm-up: how many decades in a century?

Teacher moves
  • Cross-link math
  • Set discipline routine

Direct instruction

12 min

Today we group years into ERAS. An era is a stretch of time with shared features. Our timeline has 4 named eras: (1) Time-Immemorial Indigenous presence; (2) Early arrivals and settlement; (3) Growth and change; (4) Today and tomorrow. We add COLOR SHADING to the timeline to show each era. Decades are smaller units - 10 years. Centuries are bigger - 100 years.

Key examples
  • Era, century, decade nested.
    model 10 decades (100 years = 1 century).
    prompt How many decades from 1925 to 2025?
Checks for understanding
  • Define era.
  • How many years in a decade?
Sourcework
Source type
MG-4 with new era shading
Routine
Era-grouping

Guided practice

18 min
Tasks
  • Sort 10 event cards into 4 eras.
  • Apply era-shading strips to the timeline.
Media
M-3-F-CHR-03-A Chart
Set of 4 colored translucent strips matched to MG-4 timeline at lengths reflecting each era (Time-Immemorial spans far l

Set of 4 colored translucent strips matched to MG-4 timeline at lengths reflecting each era (Time-Immemorial spans far left big stretch; Early Arrivals 1500s-1800s short stretch; Growth/Change 1800s-2000 mid stretch; Today right-most short stretch). Color codes: brown=Time-Immemorial, sepia=Early, blue=Growth, green=Today.

MG-4 Chart
Mounted along one full classroom wall at child-eye-height. The intentional LEFT-anchor in time-immemorial Indigenous pre

Mounted along one full classroom wall at child-eye-height. The intentional LEFT-anchor in time-immemorial Indigenous presence (NOT in 1492 or 1607) is the unit's most distinctive chronological move - it corrects the common 'year-zero-is-Columbus' framing. Children add localized events to the timeline lesson-by-lesson. Teacher Localization Note: the year markers and sample events MUST be replaced with locality-specific events; the framework is universal.

M-3-F-CHR-03-B Manipulative Physical / non-image

10 cards 4x6, teacher-localized with 2-3 events per era. Examples (localizable): 'Local Indigenous nation harvest ceremony continues today (Time-Immemorial)', '1873 railroad arrives (Growth)', '1965 Civil Rights march here (Growth)', '2010 new library opens (Today)'. Image + year + caption format.

Formative assessment

4 min
Exit ticket
  • Name the 4 eras of our timeline.
scoring All 4 named = mastery

Closure

3 min
Moves
  • Add 'era' and 'epoch' to Word Wall
  • Preview: tomorrow we deepen Time-Immemorial era

Homework

8 min
Tasks
  • Find one date in a family or community context and name its era.

Exercises in this lesson

hist.g3.f.chr.local_timeline.ex_03
Sort these 10 events into the 4 eras of our timeline (Time-Immemorial / Early Arrivals / Growth / Today): (1) The [Local Nation]...
 era sort · diff 3

Differentiation

Scaffolds
  • Color-coded era strips
Extensions
  • Propose a 5th era you would add
English Learners
  • Bilingual era vocabulary
Ieps 504s
  • Pre-sorted partial sort

Teacher notes

PROTOCOL: The Time-Immemorial era should INTENTIONALLY span the largest stretch on the timeline (per the LEFT-anchor protocol). This visual proportion teaches the depth of pre-contact Indigenous time. Cross-link to math: 10 decades = 1 century; 100 years; place-value to 10,000.