Grade 3

This page lists the skills and topics students will be studying in third grade. Please contact your child’s teacher if you would like to volunteer some of your expertise about a specific topic that is taught during the year. Talk to your child about the units of study to reinforce the concepts. If you have any questions about the curriculum or about your child’s learning please contact your child’s teacher.

Reading

Attitudes and Habits

• Engages in and shares self-initiated readings and writings in a variety of ways
• Reads a variety of genres: fiction, nonfiction, folktales, biographies
• Reads outside of the school day the number of minutes set by the classroom teacher

Vocabulary and Phonics

• Develops and uses new vocabulary for reading, speaking, and writing
• Uses language context, base, and compound words, prefixes, and suffixes to determine the meaning
• Uses glossary/dictionary and context to find meanings of unknown words
• Uses word relationships, such as synonyms, antonyms, and homonyms
• Uses resources to help with spelling and decoding (i.e. Quickword™ handbook, word walls, dictionaries, try it slips, priority word list, etc.)

Comprehension

• Marks up the text (using highlighters or Post-it© notes)to aid understanding
• Understands what is read
• Predicts and makes appropriate adjustments during reading
• Summarizes fiction text using characters, setting, problem, major events, solutions, and endings
• Reads non-fiction text and identifies the topic, main ideas, and relevant supporting details through guided practice
• Thinks and reads to distinguish between fact and opinion, fact and fiction, and to determine writer’s point of view
• Uses appropriate rate of reading
• Skims to get overview
• Scans for specific information
• Rereads to aid understanding
• Adjusts rate to match level of text difficulty
• Makes text-to-text comparisons, compares fiction to nonfiction(makes connection text to text, text to self, text to world)
• Rereads and self corrects to aid understanding
• Participates in sustained silent reading time

Study Skills

• Asks questions of self during reading Uses journaling and “think marks” to prepare for a discussion about text
• Uses encyclopedias (electronic and text)
• Uses parts of a book (table of contents, index, copyright, etc.)
• Uses maps, diagrams, charts, tables, timelines and illustrations
• Uses note taking to answer questions about a research topic through guided practice
• Writes reports using factual information
• Uses strategies to activate prior knowledge
• Uses strategies to gain meaning from expository (nonfiction)text Uses library resources to locate information
• Studies material outside of school to prepare for tests
• Uses an assignment notebook to keep organized and up to date

Language Arts

Listening

• Enjoys stories and poems
• Obtains information
• Follows directions
• Evaluates information

Speaking

• Responds to stories heard or read
• Participates in group discussions
• Retells and discusses text
• Participates in dramatizations, choral readings, reader's theater
• Communicates information in organized manner- sequenced detail Speaks in front of group

Writing

Mechanics of Writing

• Identifies spelling words and uses spelling patterns
• Spells priority words (1-90) correctly in written work
• Writes complete sentences
• Writes paragraphs related to a topic that are organized, uses a variety of sentence structures, and appropriately uses indention
• Uses capitalization appropriately for sentences, for proper nouns, sentences and titles
• Uses punctuation appropriately including periods, commas, apostrophes and quotation marks
• Uses proofreading to correct errors

Written Forms

Uses a variety of written forms such as the following: journal entries, reports, stories, poems/rhymes, letters /notes, directions, summaries, posters, personal narrative

Writing Process Stages

Planning

• Identifies audience and purpose
• Brainstorms ideas
• Determines format

Rough Draft

• Develops ideas
• Uses format to get their ideas on paper in a fluent manner

Revising

• Interacts with a fellow student to revise how the writing sounds

Rereads

• Changes awkward or choppy sentences
• Avoids incomplete sentences
• Checks whether purpose has been met
• Checks for spelling, capitalization, punctuation and grammar
• Changes repeated or plain words
• Works to improve organization of piece
• Works to make piece lively, smooth, and developed

Editing

• Interacts with a fellow student to edit
• Checks if the writing is ready for others to read Checks C.U.P.S. (Capitalization, Usage, Punctuation, Spelling)

Publishing Activities

• Projects are shared in a final form
• Publishes regularly

USE OF 6 TRAITS OF WRITING

Ideas

• Connects ideas and pictures (main idea/one topic only/using prewriting)
• Gets the message across (main idea)
• Chooses interesting details Focuses on staying on the topic

Organization

• Builds up details/beginning, middle, end
• Writes a strong lead
• Stays on topic
• Wraps Up – writing a strong ending

Word Choice

• Avoids repetition - adjectives
• Uses a variety of verbs and adjectives
• Reads as a source for new words/using context clues/similes

Voice

• Compares author’s voice
• Uses words to describe author’s voice
• Expresses your own voice
• Improves your voice

Sentence Fluency

• Creates fluency by combining choppy sentences
• Uses a variety of sentence starters

Conventions

• Understands punctuation/differentiates between statements and questions
• Uses editor’s marks
• Finds missing capitals
• Spots careless errors/spots sight word errors

Presentation - Presents completed work to the class or teacher

Mathematics

Mathematical Processes

• Communicates mathematical thinking, both orally and in writing, by using numbers, words and pictures
• Solves story problems

Number Operations and Relationships

• Understands place value to ten thousand
• Solves addition problems
• Solves subtraction problems
• Solves division problems
• Reads, writes, and compares fractions

Geometry

• Identifies, describes, and compares two and three-dimensional figures
• Understands geometry vocabulary

Measurement

• Counts, compares and makes change to $10.00
• Investigates measurements of area and perimeter
• Tells time to the minute
• Identifies appropriate units of measurement for length, elapsed time and capacity

Statistics and Probability

• Collects and displays data in graphs and tables

Algebraic Relationships

• Chooses correct operation (+, -, =, >, <, x, ÷) to write an equation

Social Studies

Citizenship

• Develops responsibility for activities at home and school
• Develops an awareness of decision-making skills and be able to makes appropriate choices
• Recognizes why we elect community leaders and how public leaders are elected

Geography

• Locates and identifies the continents and oceans of the world
• Uses directions to find places relative to a specific location on a map or globe
• Interprets legends and basic map symbols
• Locates the equator, prime meridian, and hemispheres on a map or globe Is introduced to the concept of latitude and longitude

Communities

• Learns the concept of goods and services
• Learns how communities help people to meet their basic needs and wants
• Studies different kinds of communities and the types of problems those communities face
• Recognizes the ways that location, climate, weather, and resources help to determine the type of community that will exist

Cultural Heritage

• Develops a strong sense of pride in their local community and an appreciation for communities unlike their own

Current Events

• Studies significant current events in the community, state, nation, and world

Native Americans

• Studies the four major Native American groups and their migration across the United States
• Becomes aware of the interdependence of these four groups and their environment

Science

Earth Science

Changes on Earth

• Identifies Earth’s layering from crust to core
• Describes how surface is slowly and quickly shaped and reshaped by way of weathering, erosion and deposition
• Describes volcanoes and earthquakes Identifies renewable and nonrenewable natural resources
• Identifies methods of conservation of resources

Solar System

• Identifies what daily and seasonal cycles tells us about our Earth, Moon and Sun
• Explains rotation and revolution of the Earth
• Explores day and night, seasons, moon phases, and eclipses
• Identifies stars and seasonal constellations
• Describes the Earth’s place in the universe and solar system
• Identifies different characteristics of planets in our solar system

Life Science

Plants and Animals

• Compares and classifies plants
• Identifies plant structural adaptations
• Explains how new plants resemble those extinct types from long ago
• Identifies types of ecosystems worldwide and describes the structure and function of ecosystems
• Explains energy transfer in ecosystems

Physical Science

Matter

• Identifies states of matter
• Identifies the qualitative and quantitative properties of matter
• Identifies physical and chemical changes and their differences
• Explains heat absorption or radiation during changes
• Explores kinds of physical changes, including dry and solute/solvent mixtures

Forces and Motion

• Identifies ways in which the motion of an object can be described, changed and measured
• Identifies forces of friction and gravity

Energy

• Identifies kinds of energy
• Explores energy conversion from one kind to another and from potential to kinetic

Sound

• Explains how sound travels
• Identifies attributes of sound and light waves
• Understands production of sound waves, electromagnetic spectrum, reflection, refraction, absorption, and optical tools

Media and Technology

• Identifies and defines basic computer technology
• Demonstrates proper care and correct use of media equipment
• Saves and backs up files on a computer hard drive, storage medium, or file server
• Identifies common types of computer software
• Demonstrates how to open and run a software program
• Creates, saves, retrieves, and deletes electronic files
• Incorporates graphics and pictures in a document
• Understands basic word processing terminology
• Produces a document using a word processing program (Microsoft Word)
• Edits a word processing document to produce a finished product