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Following a Technical Explanation is a free printable Grade 3 English worksheet on holding a chain of causes together while reading, aligned to Common Core standard RI.3.10. It prints 2 questions with an answer key on its own sheet of paper, in 25 versions that each ask 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 21 of 25 · the same problems every time you open this link.

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Set 1 has all 25 in a single PDF. All 25 sets ask different questions.

Following a Technical Explanation

RI.3.10

NameDate

Read the text, then answer the questions.

1.Read the text, then answer the questions.

How a Windmill Grinds Flour

A windmill turns moving air into turning stone. The sails are set at a slight angle. Because of that angle, wind pushing on them cannot pass straight through, so it pushes them round instead. The sails turn a horizontal shaft. A large wooden gear on that shaft meshes with a smaller one on an upright shaft, which turns the millstones below. Because the smaller gear has fewer teeth, it spins faster than the sails do. Four turns of the sails can mean twenty turns of the stone. The grain falls between two stones. The top stone turns; the bottom one does not. The grain is crushed between them, and flour comes out at the edge.

  1. 1. What would happen if the sails were flat rather than angled?
  2. 2. Put these in order: the millstones turn, the sails turn, the gears mesh.
  3. 3. Explain the cause and effect between the small gear and the speed of the stone.
2.Read the text, then answer the questions.

How Braille Was Invented

Louis Braille was blinded in an accident at the age of three. At his school, blind pupils read by tracing raised letters pressed into paper. It worked, slowly — a fingertip cannot take in a whole letter shape at once — and nobody could write that way at all. When Braille was twelve, a soldier visited the school with a code of raised dots that soldiers used to read messages in the dark. It was too complicated, but the idea of dots was right. Braille spent three years simplifying it. He settled on a cell of six dots, small enough to sit under one fingertip. He was fifteen when he finished. He was forty-three when he died, and the system was not widely accepted until after that.

  1. 1. Put these in order: he settles on six dots, a soldier visits, he loses his sight.
  2. 2. Explain the cause and effect between the soldier's visit and braille.
  3. 3. Why did the size of the cell matter so much?

LessonPrint · RI.3.10 · Set 21 · free to copy for classroom use

Answer key — Following a Technical Explanation

Set 21. Prints on its own sheet.

  1. 1.1. The wind would pass straight through and they would not turn. 2. The sails turn, the gears mesh, the millstones turn. 3. Because the smaller gear has fewer teeth, it spins faster, so the stone turns faster than the sails.
  2. 2.1. He loses his sight, a soldier visits, he settles on six dots. 2. The soldier's dot code was too complicated, but it gave Braille the idea of dots, which he spent three years simplifying. 3. It had to sit under one fingertip so a whole character could be felt at once.

Last reviewed 2026-09-05. Aligned to RI.3.10 of the Common Core State Standards for English language arts.