About this worksheet
Sea otters have no thick layer of fat like seals and whales, so they rely on the thickest fur of any animal, about a million hairs in a patch the size of a postage stamp. They float on their backs to eat, crack shellfish against rocks, and wrap themselves in kelp so they do not drift away while they sleep.
It is a good first nonfiction sheet for the set, one solid paragraph with four questions. Question three asks what kelp is, and the passage defines it in the same sentence it first appears, a habit of nonfiction worth pointing out. The last question asks for an explanation rather than a fact. Prints in black and white, and the otter can be colored in afterwards.
What students will practice
- Work out the meaning of a science word from the text
- Answer how and why questions about an animal
- Explain a fact using details from the passage
Details
- Grade level
- Grade 3
- Subject
- Reading · Comprehension
- Standard
- CCSS.ELA-LITERACY.RI.3.4
- Pages
- 1
- Format
- PDF · US Letter and A4 included
- License
- Free for classroom use · Attribution appreciated
- Last updated
- September 17, 2026
