What it is. Notes can show three levels: the main idea, what supports it, and an example.
Why our test works. Two levels sort things into big and small; three force a child to see that support and evidence are different from each other. That distinction is what makes an outline usable for writing later — and it is the structure of the essays they will write from Grade 6.
Leans on. Grade 3's two-level notes.
Watch for. A child with everything at level A has not chosen a main idea. Force one line at the margin.
Take three-level notes using Roman numeral, capital, and number. The worked example is the one you build on the board: Teacher builds an outline of a short passage on the notebook slide, adding one level at a The class reads Writing Book 4, p.41 — our own page, so a child who was absent can still get the lesson.
You open by saying where this sits — what it follows and what it is part of — in one sentence, and then you give them the reason it matters, in your own words, for about ten seconds.
Then you do one yourself, building it on the board and leaving it up: Teacher builds an outline of a short passage on the notebook slide, adding one level at a time and naming what each level means. The board copy is what they look back at when they stall, so it stays there for the whole lesson.
The We-do is the main whiteboard moment of the lesson — short answers, boards up on your signal, every child visible at once. Class places three given statements at the right level by saying I, A, or 1. If the answer is a whole sentence rather than a word, take it on their notebooks instead, because a sentence written on a whiteboard is written once and destroyed.
They open Writing Book 4 to page 41 and read it with you. Stop at the worked example and let them look at it.
Exit directions in full, standing still, before anyone moves. Then they work alone: Outline a short passage at three levels.
You close on the exit direction — Read out your one line at level I. — taken from every child before anyone stands, and then the line you want them to still have tomorrow: I, A, 1 — three levels, three sizes of idea.
A child with everything at level A has not chosen a main idea. Force one line at the margin.