• Make three points about the chapter (can be profound or simple; about the writing or your reaction to it - anything you like)
  
• Say three things you like about the chapter (ideally say why)
• Say three things you don't like about it
• Name or discuss a set of three things that appear in the chapter - e.g. three plot points, three characters, three unusual words
• Make three points that are any mixture of the above kinds of things (e.g. one plot point, one unusual word, one favourite quotation)
  
• Does anything happen three times (during the chapter, or the chapter includes an instance of something that happens three times on a wider timescale)?
• Are there any other 'threes' an eagle-eyed reader can spot in this chapter?
  
• Make a response that involves three or threes in any other way (including amusingly convoluted ways)

"The three hobbit-families of Bagshot Row, adjoining the field, were intensely interested..."
"[The dragon firework] whizzed three times over the heads of the crowd."
"Seizing a horn from a youngster near by, he blew three loud hoots. The noise subsided."
"Three dwarves came out of different rooms where they had been busy."
"They went round the hole and evicted three young hobbits ... who were knocking holes in the walls of one of the cellars."

"A day or two later a rumour ... was spread about that there were going to be fireworks."
"...and sometimes, after a glass or two, [Bilbo] would allude to the absurd adventures of his mysterious journey."
"There was almost silence, and one or two of the Tooks pricked up their ears."
"There were one or two old "mathoms" of forgotten uses that had circulated all around the district."

"Old Gaffer Gamgee got two sacks of potatoes..."
"[Frodo] had a good many friends... Folco Boffin and Fredegar Bolger were two of these..."

1. Things that really need to come in threes because for some other reason the story needs a three at that point (e.g writing practicalities; using the folktale trope of things happening three times; symbolism etc.).
2. Threes that are just a 'bunch' and where the number is of no real significance
3. Threes where it's debatable whether this particular 3 is (1) or (2) above (I suppose that will happen when somebody has found and is enjoying an interpretation that assumes (1), but it's hard to back that idea up by close reading and other standard critical tools)

1. Get as quickly as possible into an exciting scene (such as the battle the PJ film uses)
2. Start with a narrator's outline of the situation, as Tolkien actually does
3. Provide some information 'concerning hobbits', much as Tolkien did at the start of the The Hobbit - this would make sure readers realize this is a speculative fiction story: not everything is what you'd expect from real-world experience. There are short greedy people with hairy feet around!
   

1. He's very rich (but this is not resented because he is generous)
2. He's very 'peculiar' (in particular it's picked out that he one went on an adventure outside The Shire, and that he seems not to be aging)
3. He's settled his inheritance on Frodo, to the annoyance of the Sackville-Baggins branch of the family

1. Hobbit life has aspects that are familiar to Tolkien's likely first readers- Hobbits are seeming a bit British already
   
2. Hobbits like social eating and drinking
3. Hobbits like family history and gossip (and so it seems natural for us to learn a lot about Frodo and some more about Bilbo, without the exposition sounding too contrived)

1. some of his readers know about Hobbits from TH already.
2. Maybe readers were expected to be more patient in the 1950s.Nowadays a lot of stories seem to start in the thick of the action, but that can be quite confusing.
   
3. Shire life moves slowly and concerns itself much with things that seem trivial - maybe we're experiencing a bit of that in the pace of the writing