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Oral language#

Ideas to support oral language at home 

With your child, you could:

  • retell favourite stories or parts of stories in your own words
  • make up a story and act it out with costumes for a made-up story or traditional dress, and music
  • play games or complete activities that involve following instructions
  • play word games and talk about the meaning of interesting new words
  • talk about how things are grouped and the differences between these groups – for example, mammals versus amphibians or fiction versus non-fiction
  • talk about activities they have completed at school, describing what they find easy and hard.

The teacher will focus on expanding your child’s oral language skills. For example, by the end of the year your child will be able to:

  • describe experiences and tell, retell, or adapt stories, putting events in order and using lots of detail
  • explain how things can be sorted into groups, and give examples of items that belong in a group
  • plan and share short presentations about different topics, creating their own notes or cue cards to help them remember what to say
  • participate in long discussions by changing topics appropriately and offering opinions and perspectives that aren't their own, taking turns, listening carefully, asking questions, and respectfully rewording, summarising, and building on others' ideas
  • use specific words that relate to topics they are learning (for example, reproduce, aggressive, nocturnal) and that indicate the degree or extent of something (for example, completely, mostly, slightly)
  • think about and explain their learning and use strategies to improve – for example, asking questions about an unfamiliar word.

Reading#

Ideas to support reading at home

Expand your reading activities to:

  • last for 10 minutes at least without interruption
  • be an enjoyable, interesting and special time.

With your child, you could:

  • increase the variety of reading materials available to include non-fiction and fiction, recipes, simple timetables, brochures, magazines, and comics
  • make connections between what your child is reading and their life and experiences
  • look for opportunities for your child to read wherever you are – for example, signs, billboards, junk mail, recipes, and online content
  • deepen their reading experience by asking questions like, "what is the next instruction in this recipe?" "What time is the next bus to town?"
  • visit the library often and let your child choose books that interest them
  • help with any words they don't understand or look them up in a dictionary if you need to
  • read to them no matter how old they are – they can understand more challenging information than they can read.

The teacher will focus on expanding your child’s reading skills. For example, by the end of the year your child will be able to:

  • read words with less common spellings and words with 2 or more syllables, correcting their reading attempts by trying other sounds they know for letter patterns – for example, using the 'uh' sound for the 'o' in 'police'
  • use information in the text, knowledge of word parts that have a meaning, and knowledge from other subjects and topics to work out the meaning of new words and phrases
  • work out the audience and purpose of texts that entertain, inform, or persuade
  • identify the main message or idea in a text and provide the key details in order, using the paragraphs as a guide
  • use the information that is clearly stated and the information that is hinted at in a text to predict what might happen next
  • make connections between what they are reading and their own knowledge and experiences, share opinions and feelings about the ideas in texts, and discuss with others whether they have similar or different views of the text.

Texts for the third year at school#

Books used during the third year at school will be a mixture of fiction and non-fiction texts of different lengths. They will include poems, stories, plays, articles, and instructions. These texts could include Ready to Read Colour Wheel books (at Purple and Gold levels), Junior Journals, and CHAPTERS books.

There are example books on the page below.

Reading books at home in Year 3

Although your child may not bring these exact books home, they will bring texts that give them extra practise with the reading skills they have been taught.

Writing#

Ideas to support writing at home

With your child, you could:

  • encourage them to practise writing by having felt pens, pencils, crayons, and paper available
  • help them to go back and check what they have written
  • ask them to write an invitation to family, or write thank you texts or emails
  • write a short play together and use puppets to perform it to the family
  • play short, simple spelling games – for example, write as many words as you can using the letters in the word 'elephant'
  • talk to your child about what you are writing – let them help you make lists, type messages, and fill in forms.

If your child writes letters backwards or misses sounds in words, praise them for trying and encourage them to have another look at it. If the letters are backwards, you can write the correct letter for them to copy.

The teacher will focus on expanding your child's writing skills. For example, by the end of the year your child will be able to:

  • write sloped letters and numbers correctly, easily, and automatically
  • break longer words into syllables, then break each syllable into individual sounds for spelling – for example, understand – un / der / stand – u-n / d-e-r / s-t-a-n-d
  • identify why they are writing and who their audience is
  • plan and use appropriate ideas, structure, and language in their writing
  • write sentences that include extra details about the main idea, using joining words like 'although', 'because', and 'though'
  • use capital letters, full stops, commas, question marks, and exclamation marks correctly
  • write:
    • stories about 2 or more events with descriptive details about the setting, actions, thoughts and feelings, and an ending
    • a paragraph about a topic with a main idea, supporting details, and a conclusion
    • a paragraph about their opinion on a topic, with supporting reasons for their opinion and a conclusion
  • use simple notes to plan their writing and write a paragraph that follows on from their planning
  • check each sentence as they write, and improve them, when needed, by:
    • separating ideas into 2 sentences
    • combining short sentences
    • adding, deleting, or swapping words
    • fixing spelling and punctuation mistakes.

Resource#

pdf thumbnailReading and writing at home - Year 3 NZ Curriculum
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