Students will
Learning objectives
- Identify the cause and the effect in a pair of events.
- Show how one event leads to a second and a third.
- Find cause-and-effect signal words in a text.
- Explain whether an event is a cause or an effect.
Cause and Effect Graphic Organizer
Students record three cause-and-effect pairs from any text, trace a three-step chain, and decide whether one event is a cause or an effect.
Format
- Color PDFThe full-color resource, ready to print or projectAvailable
- PrintablePrinter-friendly, uses less inkAvailable
- Fillable PDFStudents type answers right into the fileAvailable
- Google ClassroomAssign and share digitallyComing soon
Only the color PDF is ready for this resource so far. The other formats are on the way.
At a glance
- Grades
- 2–5
- Pages
- 2
- Type
- Worksheet
- Includes
- Filled-in model
Last updated
Page 1 of 2
Cause and effect rows, chains and signal words
With any story or article, students write three causes, each with an arrow to its effect, then show on a chain strip how one effect sets off the next event. They hunt their text for signal words such as because and so, and decide whether a chosen event is a cause or an effect. Page 2 models the whole organizer with a short text about a windstorm that knocks out power at a school, and a card of three tests for each row starts with reading it as "___, so ___."
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From the creator
Teaching tips
1
Students often put the effect in the cause box when the text names the effect first. In the model text, "teachers rang hand bells" comes before "since the school bells were silent." Read that sentence together and ask which happened first.
2
Use the model's chain to show that an effect can become the next cause: the school losing power is the effect of the fallen branch and the cause of the cold lunch.
3
Before students use their own text, cover the model's boxes and have them fill the organizer from the windstorm text, then uncover it and compare.
Explore by skill
Skills covered
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Differentiation
Meet every learner.
Ways to adjust the cause-and-effect organizer for different readers.
Support
Fewer rows, more help
- Fill one row and the chain only.
- Write the cause in each row and have students find the effect.
- Use a short read-aloud and tell students which signal word to look for first.
On level
Teach as written
- All three rows, the chain, the signal words and "Which is it?" for one text.
- Students run the three "Check your arrows" tests on each row.
Extension
One cause, many effects
- Find one cause in the text with more than one effect and show all of them.
- Rewrite one row as a sentence using as a result.
- Extend the chain to a fourth step.
Standards alignment.
Each one is checked against the official documents. Where the resource covers only part of a standard, the note says so.
Common Core ELA · Grade 3
RI.3.8Describe how sentences and paragraphs in a text connect, such as by cause and effect
Students find causes and their effects in a text, list signal words such as because, so and as a result, and decide whether an event is a cause or an effect; a filled-in model on the day the power went out shows how. Students bring their own text, so the file has only the one short model passage.
RI.3.3Describe how events or ideas in a text connect, using cause-and-effect language
In the chain boxes students show how one event leads to the next and the one after that. The time-and-sequence and technical-steps parts of this standard are not practiced.
TEKS English · Grade 3
3.9(D)(iii)Cause and effect text structure
Students find causes and effects in a text, record them in boxes and a chain, and note the signal words, as the filled-in power-outage example shows; problem and solution is not covered, and the teacher supplies the text.
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