Math Strategies
· Make sure that your child is fluent in addition, subtraction, multiplication, and division.
· Encourage students to ALWAYS show their work.
· Make sure that your child makes it a habit to check his/her work by using inverse operations.
· Students should follow specific steps when completing word problems:
o circle/underline key numbers
o circle/underline key words
o underline the question and think about what the problem is asking
o evaluate: What steps do I take to solve? /What is my plan for solving?
· solve and check for reasonableness
Math Key Words
Memorize key words and look for them in word problems!
Addition- sum, altogether, add, earn, plus,total, found, bought, in all
Subtraction - difference,less, minus, spent, fewer, how many more, how much more, sell, left, sold
Multiplication– product, times, how many, each, altogether,how much, in all,twice as many
Division - quotient, equally, divided, each, per, share,dividend, half of, per
Round– about, estimate
Additonal Math Strategies
*To ensure that higher-order thinking can take place in daily classroom math instruction, make sure you child in fluent in key areas:
Grade 3: Multiply/divide within 100 & Add/subtract within 1000
*Make sure your child is practicing the math facts he/she struggles with. If they struggle with basic facts, it will be very difficult to build the higher-order thinking skills that are key to the new curriculum.
*Make sure your child is thinking about math in everyday situations.
*Encourage your child to explain his/her mathematic reasoning.
*Provide extra support and practice in weak areas.
Reading and Math Strategies
“Every student will be a reader, writer, thinker, and mathemetician.”
Reading Strategies
Question Stems to Guide Reading
Standard Assessed / Standard / Parent RecommendationsRL3.1 / Ask and answer questions to demonstrate understanding of a text, referring explicitly to the text as the basis for the answer. / When reading fiction or watching a movie or television show, ask your child:
· What is the story mainly about?
· What is a problem(s) that the character has to solve?
· Find the answers to questions in the text to support thinking with details from the show.
RL3.2 / Retell stories, including fables, folktales, and myths from diverse cultures: determine the central message, lesson, or moral and explain how it is conveyed through key details in the text. / When reading fiction such as The Magic Hat, The Paper Bag Princess, Cloudy with a Chance of Meatballs, Why Mosquitos Buzz, One Grain of Rice, Arrow to the Sun: A Pueblo Indian Tale, etc., ask your child:
· Identify the central message (lesson or moral) of the story.
· How does the author share the central message (lesson or theme)?
· Retell the story (beginning, middle, and end) and tell what the author was trying to teach us.
· Find details in the story to support their thinking.
L3.4a / Use the sentence as a clue to the meaning of a word or phrase in that sentence. / When reading with your child and he/she comes to an unknown word, ask the following:
· Read the sentence and think about what that word might mean.
· What clues can you find in the sentence to help understand or find the meaning of the word?
RI3.8 / Describe the logical connection between particular sentences and paragraphs in a text (e.g., comparison, cause/effect, first/second/third in a sequence). / When reading a nonfiction or informational text or watching a documentary, ask your child:
· How does the author share the information? Identify parts of the text that help answer the question?
· Read two paragraphs and ask how the ideas in the two paragraphs are connected?
· What particular words or sentences help you to know what comes next? (first, second, next, finally, etc.)
Standard Assessed / Standard / Parent Recommendations
RI3.7 / Use information gained from illustrations (e.g., maps, photographs) and the words in a text to demonstrate understanding of the text (e.g., where, when, why, and how key events occur). / When reading a nonfiction or informational text or watching a documentary, ask your child:
· How do the pictures, graphs, maps, or charts help you to better understand the text?
· Tell all of the information about the topic that can be gathered from the illustration.
· Find words in the text that match the illustration. What are they?
RI3.1 / Ask and answer questions to demonstrate understanding of a text, referring explicitly to the text as the basis for the answers. / · When reading nonfiction or informational text or watching a documentary, ask your child: What is the topic?
· Why did the author write about this topic?
· Ask your child to find the answers to questions in the text.
RI3.3 / Describe the relationship between a series of historical events, scientific ideas or concepts, or steps in technical procedures in a text, using language that pertains to time, sequence, and cause/effect. / · When reading nonfiction or informational text or watching a documentary, ask your child Which step comes first? After that
· What happened first? What comes next?
· How are ____ (events, ideas, or concepts) related?
· What was the result of ______?
· Tell me how these ideas are the same.
· Tell me how these ideas are different.
RL3.4 / Determine the meaning of words and phrases as they are used in a text, distinguishing literal from nonliteral language. / · Why did the author choose this word?
· Does the word have other meanings than the way the author used it?
RI3.4 / Determine the meaning of general academic and domain-specific words and phrases in a text relevant to a grade 3 topic or subject area. / · What do you do when you come to words you do not know?
· Are there any text features in this book that will help you? (glossary)
L3.5a / Distinguish the literal and nonliteral meanings of words and phrases in context (e.g., take steps). / · Read books such as, Amelia Bedelia series and The King Who Rained to find examples of the use of literal and nonliteral meanings of words. Identify examples and discuss.
+ For example, what does it mean to give someone the cold shoulder?
+ For example, why would an author use the term something’s fishy?
· Ask your child to be a phrase collector and write down similar phrases that they hear over the period of a day or a week.
RI3.2 / Determine the main idea of a text; recount the key details and explain how they support the main idea. / When reading nonfiction or informational text or watching a documentary, ask your child:
· What is the main idea of this text? How do you know?
· What are the important ideas in this text? How do you know? How are the important ideas connected to the main ideas?
Standard Assessed / Standard / Parent Recommendations
RL3.3 / Describe characters in a story (e.g., their traits, motivations, or feelings) and explain how their actions contribute to the sequence of events. / When reading fiction or watching a movie or television show, ask your child:
· Who are the main characters?
· Tell me how the character is feeling in this part of the story.
· Find the reasons why the character acted this way.
· How do the character’s traits contribute to the story?
· How does this character affect what happens in the beginning or at the end of the story? Why?
· What were the character’s motivations in finding a resolution to the problem?
Vocabulary Strategies
· Look for clues in context (sentences) to figure out the meaning of unknown words.
· Read the sentences around the unknown word.
· Sometimes sentences include a definition of the word. Example: Living in a frigid, orextremely cold, place can be difficult.
· Some words have more than one meaning. Use nearby words and sentences to determine the meaning.
· You can use a word you know to figure out the meaning of an unknown but related word.
· Know prefixes and suffixes:
-able able to be/-en to make or become/-er one who, more/-ly in the manner of/-ment condition or action/-ness state of being/-ful full of/anti- against/bi- two/dis- not, away/il- not/re- again, back/un- not, opposite of/mis- bad, poor/non- not/post- after/pre- before