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Science 3 — Course Syllabus

MATATAG Curriculum · Key Stage 1 · School Year 2026–2027

This is the English copy of a Filipino document. Grade 3 is taught in the mother tongue under MTB-MLE — this is the last year of it. syllabus.md is the version a teacher works from. This copy exists for observers, school heads and supervisors who do not read Filipino. Teaching from this copy would break MTB-MLE.

It is also the more authoritative copy for competency wording, because the MATATAG Science curriculum guide is written in English. Everything quoted in §2 and §4 below is the guide's own text; the Filipino copy translates it.

Learning Area Science
Grade Level Grade 3
Key Stage Key Stage 1 (Kindergarten to Grade 3)
Time Allotment 45 minutes daily · 5 days a week · 3 terms
Prerequisite There is no Grade 1 or Grade 2 Science course — see §1
Curriculum Basis MATATAG K to 10 Curriculum (DepEd, August 2023)
Calendar Basis DO No. 009, s. 2026 — three-term school calendar
Assessment Basis DO No. 015, s. 2026 — revised classroom assessment and grading
Medium of instruction Filipino — the last MTB-MLE year

The three-term school year

Term Months Weeks
Term 1 June – September 1 – 11
Term 2 September – December 12 – 22
Term 3 January – April 23 – 33

The curriculum guide predates this calendar and still assigns content to four quarters. Those competencies are unchanged — only their container moved. §4 keeps the guide's own quarter attribution on every row, and §5 shows how four quarters fit into three terms.

1. Course Description

Science 3 is the first Science course in the whole of K to 10. The curriculum guide says so directly: the science content for Kindergarten to Grade 2 "form[s] part of other curricula, including the English curriculum and the Mathematics curriculum", and is not in the Science guide at all. So there is no Science 1 and no Science 2 — but that does not mean nothing was learned. A Grade 3 class arrives with prior learning this guide does not show, and the guide says explicitly that Grade 3 use "should be built on and incorporate the content of other curricula".

This year, learners learn to observe, predict and measure — and, more than anything, that those three are different things. They examine the properties of materials around them; the difference between living and non-living; what makes things move; and the weather, the Sun, the Moon and the stars.

Everything is anchored in the child's own surroundings: the stone on the path, the vegetables in the garden, the rain on the roof, the shadow in the afternoon. Learners are expected to explain their thinking aloud, not only produce answers. This is the last MTB-MLE year, so every artifact in the set is in Filipino.

2. Grade Level Standard

Quoted verbatim from the MATATAG Science Curriculum Guide (DepEd, August 2023, page 22).

Grade 3 — At the end of Grade 3, learners demonstrate simple science process skills of observing, predicting, and measuring to explore common local materials, their physical properties, and how they have been used over hundreds of years. They locate and describe non-living things that produce useful materials. They observe, describe, and measure living and non-living things in their local environment. They describe the basic needs of living things and explain how their body parts allow them to carry out their daily activities. They recognize the need to protect the environment to ensure that the basic needs of living things can be met. Learners use everyday language to explore, describe, and make suggestions about the simple movements of objects. They learn through guided activities to make safe and careful observations of natural objects in the sky and demonstrate scientific ways of recording observations to reveal patterns in nature. Learners identify and explore sources of light and sound in their local environment and suggest how to use them safely in their lives. They apply their curiosity in the world around them and their creativity to propose solutions to simple challenges. Learners demonstrate safe handling procedures in using equipment and materials.

Key Stage 1 Standard

Quoted from page 21, because it is the standard this week's lesson is pointed at:

At the end of Grade 3, the learners acquire healthy habits and curiosity about self and their environment using basic process skills of observing, communicating, comparing, classifying, measuring, inferring, and predicting.

Seven skills, named separately. That is the curriculum reason the Week 3 lesson exists: the commonest thing a learner does wrong across all eight Science grades is state an inference as an observation, and this standard treats them as different things.

3. Content Domains

The Science curriculum uses two distinct axes, and they are routinely mistaken for each other.

3.1 The three content strands — what the learner does

Integrated throughout, not taught separately (guide, page 19):

Strand What it is at Grade 3
Performing scientific inquiry skills Observing, predicting, measuring, recording. This is the core of Grade 3 — the Key Stage 1 standard lists seven process skills as separate things.
Understanding and applying scientific knowledge Properties of materials; the needs of living things; what makes things move; patterns in weather and in the sky.
Developing and demonstrating scientific attitudes and values Curiosity, safe handling of equipment, care for the environment.

3.2 The four discipline-oriented domains — what is studied

For Grades 3 to 6 (guide, page 19):

Domain Grade 3 coverage
Materials Science in daily life; science processes; properties and uses of solid materials; safe disposal; metals in the community.
Living Things Living and non-living; growth, response, reproduction; body parts of animals and plants; basic needs; caring for the environment.
Force, Motion, and Energy Pushes and pulls; what affects movement; change of position; sources of sound and light; safety from intense light and noise.
Earth and Space Earth materials; patterns in weather; the Sun, Moon, planets and stars; safety from the Sun's light.

⚠️ Three of the four are renamed at Grade 7 — Science of Materials, Life Science, and Earth and Space Science. Only Force, Motion, and Energy keeps its name across all eight grades. This is a change of vocabulary, not of content.

3.3 One quarter, one domain

The most consequential structural fact about this course. Each quarter is a domain — not a mix of two or three as in Mathematics. The guide's own phrase is "domain quarters", and it prints a table for it on page 28.

Quarter Domain Term
1 Materials Term 1
2 Living Things Terms 1 and 2
3 Force, Motion, and Energy Terms 2 and 3
4 Earth and Space Term 3

This order is identical for Grades 3, 4, 5 and 6. It changes from Grade 7 onward — see science-spine.md §2.

4. Content Map

Every sentence below is quoted from the official curriculum guide (DepEd, August 2023, pages 29–32), committed to this repository at docs/research/source/. Competency numbers are the guide's own and are quarter-relative, so they are never renumbered by week.

New, and different from Mathematics: the Performance Tasks below are not this syllabus's suggestions. They are the guide's own, because the guide requires that "learners ... complete at least one substantial performance task for each quarter" (page 17). That is an instruction, not advice.

CG Quarter 1 — Materials

Taught in Term 1, weeks 1–8

Content Science in our daily life · Science processes · Materials and their uses
Content standards Learners learn that: 1. Science is important in understanding how the natural world works. 2. Using science process skills, simple science equipment, and participating in guided activities leads to better understanding of science. 3. Physical properties of materials determine their use.
Learning competencies The learners 1. identify objects, activities, or natural events observed in their local environment that can be explained by science; 2. participate in guided science activities by asking questions and tinkering with materials; 3. describe the uses of various science equipment and materials used in simple activities, such as a ruler, hand lens, scissors, balloons, modeling clay, and cardboard; 4. describe different science process skills used in performing simple science activities, such as observing, predicting, and measuring using units such as millimeter, centimeter, and meter; 5. describe the physical properties of solid materials, such as hard, shiny, or stretchable; 6. explain that changes in materials can be harmful to living and non-living things in the environment, such as trash disposal, and burning household materials; 7. demonstrate proper handling and disposal of materials according to their properties, such as reusing objects, disposing of excess oil into garbage, and recycling paper, plastic or glass; 8. describe how changes in solid materials make them useful, such as when they are shaped, pressed, hammered, joined, or cut; and 9. identify the properties and uses of metals used by the local community such as iron, gold, silver, and copper.
Performance standard By the end of the Quarter, learners demonstrate simple science processes to explore common local materials, their physical properties and uses. They participate in guided science activities including simple measurements using units, such as millimeters, centimeters, and meters. They demonstrate safe handling procedures to use equipment and materials.
Performance task (from the guide) Design a product out of recyclable materials that would be useful in everyday life, such as a vase, containers, clay pot, cardboard objects, recycled plastic clothes/hats, straw bags, and objects made out of aluminum or steel cans.

CG Quarter 2 — Living Things

Opens in Term 1 (weeks 9–11); completed in Term 2 (weeks 12–16)

Content Guided science activities using process skills · Living and non-living things · Characteristics of living things · Basic needs of living things
Content standards 1. Using science process skills, simple pieces of science equipment, and participating in guided activities leads to a better understanding of science. 2. Characteristics of growth, response and reproduction identify living things. 3. Body parts of plants and animals enable them to live and grow. 4. All living things have the same basic needs that need to be met by their environment.
Learning competencies 1. use the skills of observing, predicting, and measuring in performing simple guided science activities; 2. observe and describe the difference between living and non-living things and give examples of each that can be found in the local environment; 3. describe the characteristics of living things: they grow, respond, and reproduce; 4. observe and describe the outer body parts of animals, such as head, legs or wings, and identify their role to move and to gather food; 5. observe the outer parts of plants, such as leaves, roots, and stems and identify their role to get water and nutrients from the soil; 6. identify the basic needs of all living things, such as air, food, water, and shelter; 7. observe examples and explain how living things depend on one another and on the environment to meet their basic needs; and 8. recognize that there is a need to protect and conserve the environment for living things to survive.
Performance standard By the end of the Quarter, learners describe the basic needs of living things. They explain how the body parts allow them to carry out their daily activities. They recognize the need to protect the environment to ensure that the basic needs of living things can be met. They observe and measure living and non-living things in their local environment. They make models and collages of living things and their basic needs.
Performance tasks (from the guide) A. Make (create) a model of a chosen living thing using readily available recyclable or indigenous materials. B. Make a collage of the basic needs of a chosen living thing using readily available recyclable plant or animal materials.

CG Quarter 3 — Force, Motion, and Energy

Opens in Term 2 (weeks 17–22); completed in Term 3 (weeks 23–24)

Content Exploring and Questioning · Moving objects · Light and sound
Content standards 1. Objects that change position encounter a push or a pull. 2. Using science processes and curiosity is important in understanding how objects move. 3. Light and sound are examples of energy that affect daily life. 4. People can modify light and sound to make them useful.
Learning competencies 1. explore and demonstrate different ways to make objects move by natural causes, such as wind and water, or by people, such as pushing, pulling, rolling, and carrying; 2. explore and describe things that affect the movement of objects, including size, shape, heaviness, material, and surface texture; 3. measure and describe changes in the position of people or objects in relation to their original position, such as moving closer, farther, left, or right; 4. explore and describe how sound is made and transferred in everyday situations, such as the ringing of a bell or the hearing of noises; 5. describe sources of light and their use in everyday situations; 6. participate in guided science activities to explore and describe sources of light, how it behaves or can be changed, and its uses in everyday situations; 7. explain how light and sound can be harmful to people and make suggestions on how to protect oneself from them; and 8. participate in guided activities to explore and describe some ways to use movement, sound, and light to send information between two people.
Performance standard By the end of the Quarter, learners use everyday language to explore, describe, and make suggestions about simple movements of objects. They identify and explore sources of light and sound in their local environment and suggest how to use them safely in their lives. Learners apply their curiosity in the world around them and their creativity to propose solutions to simple challenges.
Performance tasks (from the guide) A. Choose a children's storybook and identify scenes where movement, light, or sound is used. Describe and show to the class how movement, light or sound is being used or changed in the story to make it real or interesting. B. Design and make a working model that can be used to send a simple message to another learner who is 5 meters away. Your device should send a message using either movement, light, or sound. Show the class your finished invention and be ready to describe how it works.

CG Quarter 4 — Earth and Space

Taught in Term 3, weeks 25–33

Content The Non-Living environment · Patterns in the weather · Celestial objects
Content standards 1. Non-living things found in the environment are the sources of useful products. 2. Weather affects our daily activities and may pose threats to health and safety. 3. The natural objects in the sky affect the activities of people.
Learning competencies 1. participate in guided activities to locate and describe different types of non-living things found in and around their school, such as rocks, soil, water, air, metals, clouds, rain, and sunlight; 2. identify some useful things that people have made from non-living materials and describe what natural materials have been used to make the items; 3. recognize that the non-living materials that make up the environment are referred to as 'earth materials'; 4. observe and record changes in the weather during a day or over some days and describe the different types and patterns of weather that occur in the local area; 5. describe how changes in the weather can affect daily activities and explain how some types of weather can be dangerous for people; 6. participate in guided activities to carefully observe and describe the natural objects commonly seen in the sky during daytime and nighttime, including the Sun, the Moon, planets, and stars; 7. participate in guided activities to explore and record how and when the Sun, the Moon, planets, and stars can be seen moving across the sky; 8. explain how natural objects in the sky affect activities of people; and 9. describe safety measures that people can use to avoid the harmful effects of the Sun's light.
Performance standard By the end of the Quarter, learners explore their immediate neighborhood to locate and describe useful non-living things that can be used by people to produce useful materials and objects. They learn through guided activities to make safe and careful observations of natural objects in the sky and demonstrate scientific ways of recording observations to reveal patterns in nature.
Performance tasks (from the guide) A. Express ideas creatively through artwork, poems, and songs, about health and safety measures to avoid the harmful effects of Sun's heat. B. Record, organize, and present observations on the changes in the weather over a period of 5 to 7 days.

5. Term-by-Term Scope and Sequence

Thirty-three instructional weeks. One rule governs the mapping, and it is applied identically to all eight Science grades in this repository:

Quarter blocks Q1 → weeks 1–8 · Q2 → 9–16 · Q3 → 17–24 · Q4 → 25–33
The last week of each block the quarter's performance task, per guide page 17
Teaching weeks per quarter seven (eight in Quarter 4)
Within a block the guide's own competency order, with naturally adjacent competencies merged into a shared week — marked ⊕

Quarter 4 gets the extra week because it falls entirely inside Term 3, which is reported to run 61 instructional days against 54 and 55 for Terms 1 and 2.

⚠️ The week mapping is this repository's, not DepEd's. The guide assigns content to quarters and says nothing about weeks. A school's approved Budget of Work replaces every week number below; none has been obtained — see source-catalogue.md. What is DepEd's is the quarter-to-domain assignment, and that is reproduced exactly.

Term 1 — June to September

Week Focus CG source Artifacts in this repo
1 ⊕ Science in my barangay and asking questions by tinkering Q1 · 1–2 —
2 Science equipment: ruler, hand lens, scissors, balloons, clay, cardboard Q1 · 3 —
3 Observing, predicting and measuring — millimetres, centimetres, metres Q1 · 4 ✔ Full set — lesson plans, slides, game, offline activities, wall chart
4 Physical properties of solids: hard, shiny, stretchable Q1 · 5 —
5 ⊕ Harmful changes to materials and proper handling and disposal Q1 · 6–7 —
6 Shaped, pressed, hammered, joined, cut Q1 · 8 —
7 Metals in the community: iron, gold, silver, copper Q1 · 9 —
8 Quarter 1 performance task — a product from recyclable materials Q1 · PT —
9 Observing, predicting and measuring applied to living things Q2 · 1 —
10 Living and non-living in my environment Q2 · 2 —
11 They grow, respond, and reproduce Q2 · 3 —

End-of-term block — assessment, remediation, reporting.

Term 2 — September to December

Week Focus CG source
12 Outer body parts of animals Q2 · 4
13 Outer parts of plants Q2 · 5
14 Basic needs: air, food, water, shelter Q2 · 6
15 ⊕ Depending on one another and protecting the environment Q2 · 7–8
16 Quarter 2 performance task — model and collage Q2 · PT
17 How objects are made to move: wind, water, push, pull Q3 · 1
18 What affects movement: size, shape, heaviness, material, surface Q3 · 2
19 Measuring change of position Q3 · 3
20 How sound is made and transferred Q3 · 4
21 Sources of light and their uses Q3 · 5
22 Guided activity on light: how it behaves and can be changed Q3 · 6

End-of-term block — assessment, remediation, reporting.

Term 3 — January to April

Week Focus CG source
23 When light and sound are harmful, and how to protect yourself Q3 · 7
24 Sending a message with movement, sound or light — and Quarter 3 performance task Q3 · 8, PT
25 Non-living things around the school Q4 · 1
26 ⊕ Things people make from natural materials and the term 'earth materials' Q4 · 2–3
27 Recording the weather over several days Q4 · 4
28 How weather affects daily activities, and when it is dangerous Q4 · 5
29 What is in the sky by day and by night Q4 · 6
30 How and when the Sun, Moon, planets and stars move Q4 · 7
31 How objects in the sky affect what people do Q4 · 8
32 Staying safe from the Sun's light Q4 · 9
33 Quarter 4 performance task — a 5- to 7-day weather record Q4 · PT

End-of-term block — assessment, closing activities, reporting.

Coverage check

CG quarter Competencies Teaching weeks PT week Where
Quarter 1 9 7 8 Term 1, weeks 1–8
Quarter 2 8 7 16 Term 1 weeks 9–11; Term 2 weeks 12–16
Quarter 3 8 7 24 Term 2 weeks 17–22; Term 3 weeks 23–24
Quarter 4 9 8 33 Term 3, weeks 25–33
Total 34 29 4 33 weeks

All 34 CG competencies are placed. None is taught twice, and none is dropped.

6. Assessment and Grading

Grade 3 is numerical this year, and descriptive one year later.

Under DO No. 015, s. 2026, descriptive Key Stage 1 grading is phased in by grade:

Grade From
Grade 1 SY 2026–2027 — this year
Grade 2 SY 2027–2028
Grade 3 SY 2028–2029

So Science 3 carries a numerical grade this year and will not in two years' time. class-record.html carries that expiry date in writing.

⚠️ This repository does not hold the Key Stage 1 weights. The 20 / 50 / 30 split is for Grades 4 and above. Putting a plausible weighting here would be easy and wrong, so the class record asks the teacher for the three weights and refuses to produce a grade until they sum to 100.

The three components

Component What it covers in this course
Written Works The worksheet, the weekly check, the learner's own written observation record
Performance Tasks The four quarterly performance tasks from the guide — required, not suggested — and the game's Teacher Panel record
Examinations The end-of-term examination

Formative assessment, used weekly

Not graded — it steers instruction.

7. Learner Support

Provision What it looks like
Below-level Object before word. Hold it, then say it, then write it. The wall chart stays up for the whole quarter. See worksheet-remediation.html — a different route, not a shorter one.
On-level The standard task with a written explanation required.
Above-level Depth, not volume — questions with more than one right answer, never more exercises.
Language All materials are in Filipino. This is the last MTB-MLE year. Each new term is introduced orally before it is read, and repeated in a fixed form of words.
Learners with additional needs Enlarged print, extended time, verbal response, a peer scribe. Every digital artifact is keyboard-operable and screen-reader labelled.
Absence and catch-up Every digital artifact is one file that copies to a phone or USB stick and runs offline at home, with no account and no connection.

8. Materials

No-cost and recycled — the default. The course is designed to run on these alone.

If available.

DepEd's equipment list for Grade 3 Science is not held here. The guide names some equipment but not what a school is assumed to have. Every artifact in this set runs without any of it, and offline-activities.en.md names the improvisation each time.

9. Curriculum Verification — Completed

This syllabus has been checked against the official curriculum guide, committed to this repository:

Item Source Status
Grade level standard (§2) CG p. 22 ✅ Verbatim
Key Stage 1 standard (§2) CG p. 21 ✅ Verbatim
The three content strands (§3.1) CG p. 19 ✅ Verified
The four domains (§3.2) CG p. 19 ✅ Verified
Domain per quarter (§3.3) CG p. 28 ✅ Verified
Quarters 1 to 4 (§4) CG pp. 29–32 ✅ Verbatim
Performance tasks (§4) CG pp. 29–32 ✅ From the guide — not suggestions
The one-task-per-quarter requirement (§4, §6) CG p. 17 ✅ Verbatim
Week mapping (§5) This repository ⚠️ Proposal — the Budget of Work that would settle it is unobtained
Three-term calendar DO No. 009, s. 2026 ⚠️ Adopted, but from reporting — the order itself is unread
Descriptive-grading phase dates (§6) DO No. 015, s. 2026 ⚠️ Adopted, but from reporting
Key Stage 1 assessment weights — ❌ Not held — which is why the class record asks for them

What opening the guide changed

Assumed Actually
There is Science in Grades 1 and 2 There is not. The Science curriculum starts at Grade 3, and the guide says K–2 science content sits in other curricula.
Each quarter mixes domains, as Mathematics does No. One quarter is one domain. The guide prints a table for it on p. 28.
Performance tasks are suggestions They are required. "The Science curriculum requires learners to complete at least one substantial performance task for each quarter" (p. 17), and the guide supplies sample tasks for nearly every quarter.
The domain order is the same in every grade No. It is the same for Grades 3 to 6 and different for Grades 7 to 10, which form a 4 × 4 Latin square.

Part of the E-turo MATATAG artifact set. Companion files: lesson-plan.en.md · lesson-plan-ilaw.en.md · assessment.en.md · offline-activities.en.md · slides.html · game.html — the last two in Filipino only.