GRADE THREE

GRADE THREE - Curriculum

The third grade curriculum includes the following:

Language Arts

Reading, writing, listening, speaking, spelling, and handwriting are all important components of language arts. Skill and strategies in each area are modeled, taught and practiced, taking into account the unique needs of each learner. Students read from a variety of texts, including fiction (short stories, textbooks, and whole books), poetry, and nonfiction (textbooks, Time For Kids, literature). Students read and write daily.

Reading

The purpose of our reading program is to help children become self directed, strategic readers who analyze, apply skills, monitor their understanding, and respond to and use ideas from their reading, using a variety of genre. Third grade students read familiar text with fluency using expression, analyze words and make connections (noticing word family patterns, beginnings, endings, compound words, etc.), and self correct errors. They are taught to use different strategies to understand text. _ Students learn to identify patterns, characters, plot, and setting; compare and contrast their own experiences with literature, make connections with other literature. Students also learn to recognize literary techniques and devices including dialogue, personification, onomatopoeia, similes and metaphors, fact and opinion, and identifying figurative language. At the beginning of each month, a reading calendar will be sent home in the Friday Folder. Each child is expected to read a minimum of 15 minutes each night.

Writing

Our writing curriculum is integrated into many other curriculum areas in order to give it meaning and purpose. Third graders write for a variety of purposes (enjoyment, communication, information recall, list making, and problem solving.) Writing is taught as a process involving several stages: Planning, drafting, revising, editing, and publishing. During the process, students are given feedback from teachers and classmates. Third grade students learn to develop pieces that show beginning, middle and end, use description in their writing, use more interesting vocabulary selection in their writing, and learn to use paragraphing. In revising and editing their writing, third graders acquire skills to correct spelling, punctuation and capitalization, and vary sentence structure.

Handwriting

The third grade handwriting program addresses both print and cursive. In cursive writing instruction we will stress proper slant, spacing, paper position, and letter size.

Word Study: Letters, Words, and How They Work

The Word Study program has taken the place of what we have in the past called “SPELLING.” The third grade program provides a comprehensive, research-based curriculum for word study, including phonics, spelling, and vocabulary. Please check your child’s weekly newsletter for Word Study Testing Dates and their self selected words in their planner. Please note: there will be weeks that are TESTED and weeks of Word Study that are NOT TESTED. Thanks for your support from home.

Math

We use Scott Foresman-Addison Wesley Mathematics in combination with Investigations in Number, Data, and Space as our core curriculum. Our curriculum is supplemented with resources from CGI (Cognitively Guided Instruction), in which students learn math through an understanding of problem solving, both word problems and symbolic problems are used. Students are encouraged to develop and communicate their own strategies by writing and sharing.

The third grade curriculum includes:

Social Studies

In third grade social studies our theme is Interdependence. This theme will be developed as we explore the community in a global setting. We will begin our study by learning more about our own community. We also begin a study of economics. By studying colonial communities we will delve into the past to understand how communities developed. Later in the year we will study Native American groups to learn about their communities, both past and present. We will investigate our ethnic origin when studying immigration to our country. This will take us into our next unit on farming. We'll look at immigrant migration to farmland compare farms of past and present. We will end the year by learning about our nation's capital, Washington DC.

Science

The hands-on FOSS Science approach is meant to motivate and stimulate student curiosity. The students will investigate, experiment, gather data, organize results, and draw conclusions based on their own actions. The information gathered in such activities will enhance the development of scientific ways of thinking.

Third graders will cover the following units:

Health

The Harcourt Health series is used as a resource to introduce students to up-to-date health information. This text puts health on an understandable, personal level. A decision-making model encourages students to make responsible decisions. Areas of study include:

Technology

Diamond Path has a flexible computer schedule, enabling the classes to use the computer lab when it pertains to curriculum areas. Students are also invited to use the computers in their classrooms. Technology is integrated into many areas of the curriculum. Each student will work on a variety of software options, relating to our areas of study. Word processing will be introduced to all third graders.