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Cause and Effect is a free printable Grade 3 English worksheet on describing why one thing leads to another, aligned to Common Core standard RI.3.3. It prints 2 questions with an answer key on its own sheet of paper, in 25 versions, 18 of them with different questions, so no two pupils in the class work from the same page. Print it from the browser or download it as a PDF — no account, no email.

Set 2 of 25 · the same problems every time you open this link.

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One paper per pupil

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Set 1 has all 25 in a single PDF. 18 of these 25 sets ask different questions — this skill does not have 25 questions to give. The rest reorder them, so no two pupils have the same paper in front of them.

Cause and Effect

RI.3.3

NameDate

Read the text, then answer the questions.

1.Read the text, then answer the questions.

Morse Code

Morse code turns every letter into a pattern of short and long signals: dots and dashes. The commonest letters were given the shortest patterns. E is one dot. T is one dash. Q, which is rare, is dash-dash-dot-dash. Because of that choice, an average message is much shorter than it would be otherwise. A message can be sent as sound, as light, or as taps on a pipe. That is why it survived so long: it needs almost no equipment. Timing carries the meaning. A dash is three times as long as a dot. The gap between letters is three dots long, and between words, seven. SOS was chosen because it is easy to recognise: three dots, three dashes, three dots.

  1. 1. Explain the cause and effect between letter frequency and message length.
2.Read the text, then answer the questions.

Turning Milk into Cheese

Cheese begins as an accident that people learned to repeat. Milk is mostly water with fat and protein in it. To make cheese, the protein has to be separated out. A starter culture of bacteria is added first. The bacteria turn some of the milk sugar into acid, and the acid begins to make the protein clump together. Then rennet is added, which finishes the job. The milk splits into solid curds and watery whey. The whey is drained off. The curds are pressed, salted, and left to age. Time does the rest: a cheese aged for two years tastes nothing like the same cheese at two weeks.

  1. 1. Explain the cause and effect between the acid and the curds.

LessonPrint · RI.3.3 · Set 2 · free to copy for classroom use

Answer key — Cause and Effect

Set 2. Prints on its own sheet.

  1. 1.1. Because common letters got short patterns, an average message came out much shorter.
  2. 2.1. The acid makes the protein clump together, and rennet finishes it, so the milk splits into curds and whey.

More practice for RI.3.3

Explain how events or steps connect, using time and cause words.

Teaching this next? Cause, Sequence and Time Language is the 40-minute plan for it, with the misconceptions to expect.

All Grade 3 worksheets

Last reviewed 2026-09-05. Aligned to RI.3.3 of the Common Core State Standards for English language arts.