Last on my goal list is 3rd Grade Homeschool Goals. If you missed the others, I am posting our homeschool goals for the 2019-2020 school year.
Each year, I start my yearly planning with making a list of goals for each of my children. Once I can nail down the areas that need the most attention, I will have a good idea of what our curriculum will be.
And once the curriculum is planned, I can start to brainstorm what our days might look like in terms of routine and schedule.
If you have older children, you might be interested in taking a look at our 7th Grade Homeschool Goals or our 5th Grade Homeschool Goals.
Today, I am sharing academic goals for my 8 1/2 year old daughter, a rising 3rd grader.
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3rd Grade Homeschool Goals
My 8 year old has struggled with learning to read. We have spent an inordinate amount of time on phonics, and I am finally starting to see some real fruit from all of the hard work!
We spent years with All About Reading, however, it wasn’t enough writing for her. Her brain needs to write in order to make the connections with phonics.
During the 1st half of Second Grade, we worked our way through Memoria Press’ First Grade phonics curriculum, and completed almost all of the Second Grade Reading Curriculum (it includes phonics). We were able to move at a speedy pace because she didn’t need the amount of review that was present in the curriculum.
Just a note: If I was doing Memoria Press 1st Grade curriculum with a 1st Grader, I would definitely use their pacing and not speed it up.
For this particular child at this age and stage, we could do that and not “skip” important concepts. The whole point of backing up to First Grade reading was to solidify phonics and increase reading fluency. This method worked beautifully for her!
That being said, we are working on these areas for my 8 year old, rising 3rd grade girl:
Phonics and Reading Fluency
Although she is reading at grade level, my 3rd grader still needs “maintenance” phonics support and quite a bit of practice to increase her reading fluency.
We didn’t make it to Little House in the Big Woods in the Memoria Press 2nd Grade Reading Curriculum, so we are going to start there for her 3rd grade year. The 2nd Grade reading curriculum still has a focus on phonics work, so this will be the perfect start to her 3rd grade year.
Plan of Action: After Little House, we will then move on to the regular 3rd grade Literature set. The 3rd grade set assumes that children are reading on grade level, so the phonics work is no longer present in the Student Guides.
We will use the pacing that Memoria Press suggests, so that will give the two of us ample time to read the literature selections aloud, and answer the comprehension questions together.
My 3rd grader will also work through Traditional Spelling II, which is heavy in phonics work. She blossomed before my very eyes using Traditional Spelling I, and I can’t wait to see how well she is going to do with II.
Lastly, I will require 15-20 minutes of silent reading every day from a choice of books I assign.
→ You can read more about our experience with Traditional Spelling I.
Math Facts
Math Facts are a recurring theme here at the Hill House. Even my rising 9th grader is going to hone his math facts this year, which was his idea, not mine!
Despite working through flash cards every day and working on memorizing the triplets, this is still a problem area. We’re going to spend time in 3rd grade making sure her math facts are as solid as possible.
Plan of action: My 3rd grader will keep on with daily flash cards and memorizing the triplets with triplet flash cards. I had a light bulb moment at the end of this school year – it took a significant amount of the physical act of writing for my daughter to make the connection with reading.
Maybe this same concept applies to math facts, too. I’m going to test this theory with her, and make sure she is writing the facts as well. I have a lot of drill sheets that require written answers, so that will be daily math work for her.
In this photo:
→ Rod & Staff Math 3rd Grade
→ Subtraction Flash Cards
→ Addition Flash Cards
→ Triplet Flash Cards (Mama made. Coming soon!)
Memorization and Recitation
My 8 year old committed an enormous amount of Scripture to memory through Awana this past year. I’m so proud of her! She also memorized quite a bit of poetry during her second grade year and felt such a sense of satisfaction!
This sweet girl enjoys memorizing and learning recitation, so we will press on with more of that this year.
Plan of Action: We will learn the Recitation in Memoria Press’ 3rd Grade curriculum, continue learning Scripture in Awana, and start learning a few poems from Poetry for the Grammar Stage.
She will learn “The Happy Farmer”, “The Hayloft”, “The Lamb”, “Our House”, “Try, Try Again”, and “The Wind”, which are found in the Poetry program.
In this photo:
→ Memoria Press 3rd Grade Curriculum Guide (contains the recitation). You can also purchase only the 3rd Grade Recitation in digital form for only $3.
→ Poetry for the Grammar Stage
→ Copybook Cursive II
Independent Work
Lastly, I want my 3rd grader to do just a few things on her own this year. Last year, we completed all of her school work together, except for the occasional math worksheet.
This year, I want her to complete a few of her assignments independently after I do the teaching and she understands the directions.
Plan of Action: For the subjects of math, English Grammar, Latin, and literature definitions, and US History, I am going to spend several weeks modeling and instructing the expectations of her independent work. Then I’m going to slowly let her take on these tasks herself, one by one as to not overwhelm her.
For example, for math, she will complete the math assignment after we work on the lesson, and she will complete her English assignment once I’m confident she understands the directions and knows how to neatly write the answers on her paper.
Prima Latina follows the same type of work each week, so I hope to have her completing portions of the assignments on the days we don’t have a teaching lesson.
My 3rd grader is asking for more independent work, so she’s ready to get started on these baby steps towards independence.
And that’s plenty of academic goals for this 3rd grader!
Do you set goals for your 3rd grader? If so, what are they like? I’d love to read them in the comments!
Alexander and the Terrible, Horrible, No Good, Very Bad Day Children’s Book with Learning Ideas
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