Last Updated on Thursday, 08 September 2011 12:51

Overarching Theme: Systems

Below you will find a list of essential skills that are taught in each of the core subjects in third grade. This is not intended to be an all-inclusive list of skills taught in this grade. Instead, it is designed to give parents an overview of those skills that are considered essential for academic success in the third grade.

In addition to the skills listed below your son will be asked to use the following skills and strategies in each unit across all subject areas:

• Think critically, creatively and connectedly
• Participate in thinking routines to deepen understanding of content and skills and make thinking visible in the classroom
• Use a language of thinking to describe his thinking and the thinking of others
• Collaborate with classmates to solve problems and accomplish tasks
• Use technology to access and analyze information
• Communicate effectively both orally and in written form

LITERACY

READING

Unit Name/Content: Novel Studies (Stone Fox, The Cricket in Times Square, Mr. Tucket and Charlotte’s Web)

Essential Skills:

• Demonstrate understanding of previously introduced decoding and word recognition skills by applying those skills when reading silently and orally with a variety of texts
• Read fluently and with expression
• Begin to make text-to-text, text-to-self, and text-to-world connections while reading
• Gain understanding of the text by applying the following comprehension strategies: determine main idea, read for details, make predictions, infer meaning, sequence events, summarize, distinguish fact from opinion, draw conclusions, identify cause and effect relationships, use context clues to determine meaning, and compare and contrast
• Identify story elements: plot (including sequencing of events), setting, characters and can retell a story
• Understand and apply new vocabulary
• Begin to identify the author’s purpose (to inform, persuade, entertain or describe) in a reading selection
• Begin to self monitor comprehension strategies when reading independently

WRITTEN EXPRESSION AND GRAMMAR

Unit Name/Content: The Sentence/Four Types of Sentences

Essential Skills:

• Identify the four types of sentences (declarative, interrogative, exclamatory, imperative)
• Create examples of each of the four types of sentences
• Identify and correct sentence fragments and run-on sentences
• Understand reasons for combining sentences and effectively combine sentences
• Define and identify complete subjects and predicates
• Apply understanding of types of sentences in student-generated writing samples
• Apply understanding of sentence fragments and run-on sentences in student-generated writing samples
• Apply understanding of complete subjects and predicates in student-generated writing samples

Unit Name/Content: Parts of Speech/Nouns

Essential Skills:

• Know and understand the definition of a noun
• Identify singular, plural, common, proper, possessive nouns in a sentence
• Apply understanding of singular, plural, common, proper and possessive nouns in student-generated writing samples

Unit Name/Content: Parts of Speech/Pronouns

Essential Skills:

• Know and understand the definition of a pronoun
• Identify pronouns in a sentence
• Begin to apply understanding of singular, common and possessive pronouns in student-generated writing samples

Unit Name/Content: Parts of Speech/Adjectives

Essential Skills:

• Know and understand the definition of an adjective (including the 3 questions used to identify adjectives)
• Identify adjectives in a sentence
• Identify the noun modified by an adjective in a sentence
• Apply understanding of adjectives in student-generated writing samples

Unit Name/Content: Parts of Speech/Verbs

Essential Skills:

• Know and understand the definition of an action verb
• Identify past, present, and future tenses of verbs
• Apply understanding of verbs in student-generated writing samples

Unit Name/Content: Parts of Speech/Adverbs

Essential Skills:

• Know and understand the definition of an adverb
• Identify adverbs in a sentence
• Apply understanding of adverbs in student-generated writing samples

Unit Name/Content: The Writing Process

Essential Skills:

• Write a grade-appropriate paragraph with a topic sentence, supporting details and a concluding sentence
• Use the steps in the writing process to create a grade-appropriate narrative that has a beginning, middle and end and uses descriptive words or phrases to develop ideas and advance the characters, plot and setting.
• Use grade-appropriate spelling, punctuation, capitalization, grammar, and word usage to effectively complete a variety of writing tasks

MATH

Unit Name/Content: Numbers, Numeration, Operations and Computation

Essential Skills:

• Understand, memorize and apply addition, subtraction and multiplication facts to 12
• Add and subtract whole numbers to the thousands place with regrouping
• Read and write whole numbers to the millions
• Compare and order numbers to millions
• Identify and understand place value to the millions
• Process and solve word problems
• Identify and use fact families in all operations (addition, subtraction, multiplication and division)
• Read and write decimals to the hundredths place (as it relates to money)
• Understand place value in decimals (tenths and hundredths place) (as it relates to money)
• Identify and write fractional parts of shaded regions of objects
• Identify the numerator and denominator of fractions
• Round numbers to the nearest hundred
• Apply computation skills to real life situations

Unit Name/Content: Geometry and Measurement

Essential Skills:

• Identify and describe the properties of geometric shapes
• Identify and draw line segments, rays and angles
• Identify and create symmetrical objects
• Identify and create parallel, nonparallel and intersecting lines
• Measure objects to the nearest half inch, foot, centimeter and meter
• Determine area and perimeter
• Tell time to the nearest minute
• Identify all coins and make coin exchanges
• Write monetary amounts in dollars and cents notation
• Understand how to apply measurement and geometry skills to real world situations

Unit Name/Content: Patterns, Algebra, and Functions

Essential Skills:

• Read, write, and explain number sentences using symbols +, -, x, ÷, <, and >
• Extend, describe and create numeric patterns
• Understand and explain how numbers operate as a system
• Solve problems with missing addends and subtrahends

Unit Name/Content: Data and Probability

Essential Skills:

• Describe events using certain, very likely, likely, unlikely, and/or impossible
• Collect and organize data to create charts, tables and bar graphs
• Use charts, tables and bar graphs to ask and answer questions and draw conclusions
• Find the maximum, minimum, range, mode and median of a data set
• Relate data and its collection to real life situations

SOCIAL STUDIES

Taught Through the Concept of Systems

Unit Name/Content: Where in the World Am I? (Geography Skills)

Essential Skills:

• Understand that geography helps us to understand the world through place and location
• Identify and place in order by its size the smallest to largest place of our position on earth (home address, city, county, state, region, country, continent, hemisphere, planet, galaxy)
• Understand and explain how the world operates as a system
• Understand and explain how the United States operates as a system
• Identify and locate the 50 US states by regions
• Identify and locate continents and oceans
• Identify and use cardinal directions
• Begin to use scale of miles and read a map legend
• Begin to apply map skills to understand the world in which we live

SCIENCE

Unit Name/Content: The Solar System

Essential Skills:

• Understand and explain how the solar system and its components operate as a system
• Identify planets in the solar system in order from the sun
• Compare and contrast characteristics of planets
• Understand and demonstrate/explain the planet actions of rotation and revolution

Unit Name/Content: Human Body Systems

Essential Skills:

• Understand and explain how the human body operates as a system
• Identify the major body systems and functions (skeletal, muscular, circulatory, respiratory, digestive and nervous)
• Recognize the major organs of each body system
• Identify some of the bones in the human body
• Examine the Food Pyramid Guide

Unit Name/Content: The Scientific Method

Essential Skills:

• Conduct experiments using the steps in the scientific method
• Make observations using all senses
• Draw conclusions based on evidence and observations
• Form a hypothesis
• Record data as related to individual experiments
• Use materials appropriately
• Measure using appropriate measuring tools (thermometer, scale, tape measure, beaker, etc.)