Before embarking on third grade, know where you're starting and where you're heading. According to child development experts, third graders, at the onset of the academic year, should be able to convincingly and expressively read at grade level. Your student should be knowledgeable in basic grammar (nouns, verbs, adjectives) and apply proper capitalization and punctuation. If your student has a few weak areas, use the school year to strengthen these.
General goals for third-grade reading and writing are to move the child to a more independent learning style, to promote research skills and mastery of cursive handwriting. It's in third grade, typically, that students produce independent book reports and learn to self-edit work. Prior to choosing a curriculum, be sure to check your state's board of education guidelines. Some states have additional requirements, and you'd want to know these before picking material. Two options for curriculum are prepackaged products and self-designed programs.
It can be easier for parents to use prepackaged curriculum. Many provide textbooks, workbooks, activities and even lesson plans. For structured learning, choose traditional options, such as Bob Jones University's program. This comes with instructional videos, lesson plans, visual aids and student materials. Another in this category is Calvert Schools. As children move through third grade, predicting conclusions in reading, along with grasping central ideas and supporting elements, is important. Calvert excels at providing material and meticulous lesson plans to enhance these skills through art history, mythology and classic literature. All materials (even pencils) are provided by Calvert. Other options are the "Learning Language Arts through Literature" series and the Shurley English program. Each employs critical reading, expository writing and thinking skills. (See links for products below.)
Designing learning to fit your lifestyle and student is a beautiful component of homeschooling. Crafting a program based on your child's needs for third-grade reading and writing can be as simple as choosing topics of interest, reading together aloud and independently, and requiring your student to write a comprehensive book report about the subject. Have your child proofread and edit his paper. Take spelling words from books read or from errors in the student's reports, and conduct spelling tests. Use science topics, historical events, biographies and classic literature to incorporate into your reading and writing program. Children should be able to use phonics and prompts from context to decode words. Writing in narrative, paragraph form and reading for pleasure and information are basic foundations of third grade. Accomplish these easily by journaling, reading aloud and asking subject-matter questions of students when they've read independently. Make students aware of research materials, such as dictionaries, encyclopedias and internet sources to find information.