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How Actions Drive the Story is a free printable Grade 3 English worksheet on explaining how what a character does shapes the events, aligned to Common Core standard RL.3.3. 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 15 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.

How Actions Drive the Story

RL.3.3

NameDate

Read the text, then answer the questions.

1.Read the text, then answer the questions.

Conker

First stanza: Inside the green and spiny case, packed in a lining soft as silk, it waits all summer in the dark and grows the colour of stained milk. Second stanza: Then autumn cracks the case in two. It falls. It hits the path and shines so hard and bright and newly made you cannot walk past it. Nobody can. Third stanza: By Sunday it is dull and cracked and lighter than it was before — a small brown stone inside a pocket, and no one wants it any more.

  1. 1. Put these in order: it hits the path, it waits in the dark, it goes dull.
2.Read the text, then answer the questions.

Why Anansi Has Thin Legs

Long ago Anansi the spider had eight fat legs, and a nose for other people's cooking. One morning he smelled beans at Rabbit's house. "Tie a web to my leg," he told Rabbit, "and tug it when the beans are ready." Rabbit agreed. Then Anansi smelled fish at Monkey's, and yams at Guinea Fowl's, and soup at Warthog's. To each he said the same thing. By noon he had eight webs tied to eight legs. At noon every pot was ready at once. Eight tugs came together. The webs pulled so hard that Anansi's legs stretched thin as thread — and he got no dinner at all. They have been thin ever since.

  1. 1. How do Anansi's actions cause the ending?
  2. 2. Describe Anansi's motivation. What does he want, and what does he do about it?
  3. 3. What happened between Rabbit agreeing and the eight tugs?

LessonPrint · RL.3.3 · Set 15 · free to copy for classroom use

Answer key — How Actions Drive the Story

Set 15. Prints on its own sheet.

  1. 1.1. It waits in the dark, it hits the path, it goes dull.
  2. 2.1. Because he made eight arrangements, all eight tugs came at once and stretched his legs. 2. He wants as much free food as possible, so he arranges a web with every neighbour at once. 3. Anansi made the same arrangement with Monkey, Guinea Fowl and Warthog.

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