Skip to content
LessonPrint

Main Ideas from What You Heard is a free printable Grade 3 English worksheet on pulling the main ideas out of something presented, aligned to Common Core standard SL.3.2. 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 22 of 25 · the same problems every time you open this link.

Next setLesson plan

One paper per pupil

12345678910111213141516171819202122232425

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

Main Ideas from What You Heard

SL.3.2

NameDate

Read the text, then answer the questions.

1.Read the text, then answer the questions.

How a Canal Lock Works

A canal cannot run uphill. Where the land rises, engineers build a lock: a chamber with a gate at each end. A boat going uphill enters the lock through the lower gate. The gate closes behind it. Sluices in the upper gate are opened. Water flows in from the higher stretch of canal, and the boat rises with it. No pump is needed, because the water comes down by gravity. When the water inside matches the level above, the upper gate can be opened and the boat moves on. Going downhill, everything runs the other way: the water is let out, and the boat sinks with it.

  1. 1. What are opened to let the water in?
  2. 2. Summarise this text in one sentence.
  3. 3. Which gate does a boat going uphill enter through?
2.Read the text, then answer the questions.

Why Swallows Leave

Swallows do not leave Britain because of the cold. They leave because of the insects. A swallow eats flying insects, and it catches them in the air. In October the insects disappear, and a bird that eats nothing else has to follow the food. So swallows fly to southern Africa: about six thousand miles, taking roughly six weeks. They travel by day and feed as they go. They lose about a third of their body weight on the way. Many do not arrive. The following spring they return, and a swallow will often nest in the very barn it hatched in.

  1. 1. What is the main idea of this text, and which details support it?
  2. 2. Summarise this text in one sentence.
  3. 3. How much weight do they lose?

LessonPrint · SL.3.2 · Set 22 · free to copy for classroom use

Answer key — Main Ideas from What You Heard

Set 22. Prints on its own sheet.

  1. 1.1. Sluices in the upper gate. 2. A canal lock is a chamber with two gates; letting water in by gravity raises a boat to the higher level, and letting it out lowers one. 3. The lower gate.
  2. 2.1. Swallows migrate to follow their food — supported by their diet, the October insect drop and the journey south. 2. Swallows fly six thousand miles to southern Africa because the flying insects they eat disappear in October, and return the next spring. 3. About a third of their body weight.

More practice for SL.3.2

Pick out the main ideas and details from something you heard or saw.

Teaching this next? Getting the Main Ideas From Listening is the 40-minute plan for it, with the misconceptions to expect.

All Grade 3 worksheets

Last reviewed 2026-09-05. Aligned to SL.3.2 of the Common Core State Standards for English language arts.