Ready for day 2, sharing all about 3rd grade! (If you missed my post from yesterday sharing our 1st grade curriculum picks, check it out HERE.)
Third grade was one of my favorite years in school, so I’m excited for this upcoming school year for 3rd grade with my son. A lot of the curriculum we found that works best for him, he will be continuing the next level for 3rd grade. Language Arts will be his biggest change, trying something completely new.
Below I’m sharing all his core curriculum that we like to try to have completed before lunch each day. In the afternoon is when we complete our extra subjects of history, science, and geography. We like to do those subjects all together as a family, so I will be sharing them in a separate blog post. (Read it HERE!)
3rd Grade Curriculum 24-25 School Year
Bible- Meeting with Jesus
We have a Bible curriculum that we are using together as a family that I will share later this week. However, we will only be doing about one lesson per week, so I wanted something my older kids could do independently every day. My daughter started using this book Meeting with Jesus by David Murray last year and really enjoyed it, so I got one for him to do as well. Each day it gives a short scripture passage for them to look up and read in their bibles, and one simple question to answer after. There is also a place for weekly prayers and memory verses. It is super quick to complete, can be done independently, and is a great reading plan for children ages 6-12. Both of my kids have THESE children bibles that have easier to read text they use alongside this study.
Language Arts
This year my son will be switching from The Good and the Beautiful Language Arts to Brave Writer Dart for his core Language Arts curriculum. (More explanation on why we decided to switch and all about the Dart curriculum HERE.) He has been watching my daughter use this curriculum for 2 years now and is very interested/requesting to try it himself. I think he is really going to enjoy it!
Each Dart is a 4-week guide and uses a novel/chapter book to teach grammar and writing concepts. I really love how they are able to learn about language arts concepts through the great literature they are reading. Every month is a new book and guide, so it always feels new and fresh throughout the year, while keeping our daily rhythm the same. *They do not have to read the chapter books on their own for each Dart, see some different things we do to read them together on THIS post.
We aren’t sure what books/Darts we will be using next year just yet. At the end of May (May 30th to be exact) Brave Writer will be releasing the books for the 24-25 school year. They do a really fun live event that we love to watch and get a better description of each of the books chosen. I always watch this first and see if we are excited/interested in ALL the books that will be part of the bundle and read my own reviews. If there are some that we have maybe already read before or I know my children won’t enjoy (maybe a genre they don’t like), then I choose to just purchase Literature Singles from their archive throughout the year. (*I purchase one each month to spread out the cost, but the bundle really does save you money if you like all the books!) They have tons of great past book guides you can purchase anytime. I already have a list of books/guides I know he will enjoy if we choose not to purchase the bundle. I will be sharing all the books we end up choosing for next year on my Instagram beginning of June. **Update: See all the books/guides we used this school year HERE!
**Use this referral link to get $10 off your order at Brave Writer!
**Check out the book reports we complete at the end of each book they finish: Book Reports
Grammar– Fix It Grammar Level 1
I love to use Fix It Grammar alongside Brave Writer Dart for extra daily grammar practice. Each week their is one short lesson taught by the teacher/parent and then every day after they are given a sentence to “fix.” They have to find and mark what it asks at the top (nouns, verbs, adjectives, etc.), they have to fix any mistakes (punctuation, capitals, etc.) and rewrite the sentence correctly at the bottom. He will be starting with Level 1 and using it independently about 2-3 times per week.
Yes, you need the teachers manual! It is very helpful to quickly check answers when they are done or to look up something if they have a question! Sometimes you will be stumped by a question. 😆
Handwriting– The Good and the Beautiful Level 3 (Beginning Cursive)
We are using Level 3 handwriting from The Good and the Beautiful for beginning cursive. My daughter used this book a few years ago and I really love the way they teach cursive. They use a rainbow dot system to show how to correctly form cursive letters. (Follow the dots red, orange, yellow, green, blue, purple to form the letter correctly.) He will complete this book independently doing one page about 3 days per week.
Spelling– Evan Moore Building Spelling Skills Level 3
He used Evan Moore Building Spelling Skills last year for second grade and it worked really well for him, so we are continuing with level 3 for 3rd grade. We do the pre-test at the beginning of the week, then he completes one page per day independently to practice the spelling words throughout the week.
Writing– WriteShop Junior Book D
This is a new to us curriculum this year that I’ll be using with my 3rd and 5th grader together. WriteShop Junior Book D is geared for ages 8-11. This curriculum provides fun hands-on activities to practice grammar and writing, including creative, expository, narrative, and persuasive writing. They will learn how to practice brainstorming, planning, organizing, and self-editing in their writing projects. It has 10 lessons throughout the school year, taking 2-3 weeks to complete one lesson. The teacher guide gives great examples on how to break down the lessons each day using a 2-week or 3-week schedule to complete each lesson. I LOVE how spaced out everything is so they can take their time with their writing.
For each lesson they will create a Fold-N-Go Grammar folder, have a pre-writing activity, engaging activities to teach the lesson, review and skill building, a writing project, and how to edit revise. I think they will really enjoy these projects and help teach them more structure in writing a proper paragraph and essays in the future. You can see lots of samples and a placement quiz on their website HERE.
I’ll be sharing a lot more about how I prep this curriculum and implement it into our school days later on.
Math– Simply Good and Beautiful Math Level 3
We love this math curriculum and will continue to use the next level for third grade. This curriculum teaches concepts in such a thorough and fun way with lots of games. It is a spiral method, so they are always reviewing and keeping up with the concepts they have previously learned. Alongside this, we will also use Musical Multiplication from TGATB. My daughter did so well learning her multiplication facts with these songs, so I think my son will enjoy them too.
Typing– Typing.com
Third grade is when I start to introduce some typing lessons. Earlier than this, they usually get too frustrated because of their smaller hands. We like to use the free lessons from Typing.com and try to complete a lesson twice per week.
That is everything for 3rd grade!
Although it seems like a lot, most of his work can be completed independently and we don’t do everything every day. My kids use THESE independent checklists, so they know what to complete each day. (*They know to complete one page of each if it is on the list.) They are able to start their day without me and get anything done (Bible, Handwriting, Fix It Grammar, Spelling, and Typing) before I jump in to help with Math and Dart (LA.) I check their work later and help with any mistakes. This has been SO helpful in teaching multiple kids and getting everything done in a timely manner.
Here is an example of his checklist for 3rd grade. *I do update these throughout the year as needed.
A typical homeschool day:
• breakfast & books • get ready for the day • independent work • play break or a walk • Language Arts & Math lesson • lunch • play • reading (30 min) • history or science • clean up • extra curricular activites (baseball)
We like to get all our core work done before lunch and then do history or science in the afternoons. We complete history usually 2-3 days per week (Monday-Wednesday) and science on Friday’s. We take Thursday’s off for co-op every other week.
I’m excited to try some new things for him next year and watch him grow in his learning! Next I’ll share all the curriculum choices for my 5th grader! *Update: find the blog post HERE!
Happy Tuesday!
– Lindsay
3rd Grade Curriculum Round Up:
Bible- Meeting with Jesus
Language Arts- Brave Writer Dart
Grammar- Fix It Grammar Level 1
Handwriting- The Good and the Beautiful Level 3 (Beginning Cursive)
Spelling- Evan Moore Building Spelling Skills Level 3
Writing- WriteShop Junior Level D
Math- Simply Good and Beautiful Math Level 3
Interested in what we used for our 2nd grade year, read it HERE!
Do you do any type of science or history/geography?
Yes we do all of those! We do them as a family though, so I am sharing them all together in a separate blog post later this week. 🙂
This will be our first year homeschooling but our son would be going into 3rd grade in ‘traditional’ school. I’m curious if there is a way to know if he is ready for some of these lessons or if we should consider starting at a different level. These lessons look amazing though and I think he would really enjoy most of them.
Many of the curriculum we use offer placement test or quizzes on their websites to help you decide where they should start, or they offer lots of sample pages so you can look through everything and see if it will be a good fit.
Do you know an easy way to see the specific skills worked on for each dart? I’m trying to choose books that work on different skills and I thought there was a list but I am having a hard time finding it.
If you click on the specific Literature Singles you can see an inside look of some of what is learned about in each guide, but they all have a great mix of some things that would be new and some review.
Would you introduce learning a new nd language for third grade (like Spanish?) if so what program would you use for this age (3rd grade / 8 yrs) ?
We use homeschoollanguages.com for foreign language curriculum and it is the best for kids (all ages!) It is super fun and hands-on, my kids love it. We are using it for Spanish this year, but they have other languages to choose from.