Fun 3rd Grade Games and Activities for Home or School

Games and Activities for 3rd Graders

As the parent, you know your child the best, so create activities that appeal to your 3rd grader's interests. For example, if he or she enjoys going on shopping trips, be creative and turn it into a math activity by having him or her add the total amount.

If you are a teacher, use hands-on games and activities to capture your students' attention. Additionally, games can provide excellent review because they often incorporate repetition. Remember, students are often motivated by friendly competition, so try breaking your students into teams and assigning points for each correct answer.

Dice Game

This game will help 3rd graders brush up on multiplication skills. During each turn, the players should roll two dice and multiply the two numbers together. The person with the highest answer wins that round. If a player gets the answer wrong, he or she gets zero points for that round. Play about ten rounds total.

This game can be modified to help your child or students practice addition, subtraction and division skills as well. The rules remain the same; simply change the operation that the students perform. As a challenge, you can add a third dice to multiply, add or subtract with.

Making Goop

This experiment will teach 3rd graders about the four states of matter and how a substance can occasionally display properties of more than one state. You will need:

• Two bowls
• Measuring cups and spoons
• Bottle of white glue
• Water
• Laundry booster

In the first bowl, mix together ½ cup water and ¼ cup glue. In a separate bowl, put 1/3 cup of warm water and three tablespoons of laundry booster and mix well. Combine the this mixture with the glue mixture and stir together. Pick up with your hands and massage it for a few minutes. Your child will notice that it acts like a liquid when held still and a solid when it is jiggled around.

Explain to your child or students that while, typically, matter is either a solid, liquid or a gas, sometimes a substance can have properties of more than one state, which is called a polymer. The goopy substance is a polymer because it has the qualities of both a solid and a liquid.

Write as a Team

This fun activity will build students' writing skills. In a classroom, break students into groups and have them go through some old magazines to find a picture that they find interesting. Have each student write the beginning of a story about the picture and pass it to another person in their group. The students should continue to pass it back and forth until the story is complete. When the story is finished, have students read it out loud.

If you're doing this activity at home, have your child pick out an interesting picture and begin the story. Then, he or she can pass the story to you. After writing, encourage your child to share the story with another family member or a friend.