In year 3, addition and subtraction focusses on mental addition and subtraction questions, formal written methods of columnar addition and subtraction, estimating and checking answers and solving addition and subtraction problems.
This page aims to provide you with all the Year 3 Addition and Subtraction National Curriculum objectives, along with some guidance for each objective and a range of games and activities that can be used to meet the learning objective in a play-based way.
Teaching Year 3 Addition and Subtraction:
| National Curriculum Objective | Things to think about … | Playful Learning Games |
| Add and subtract numbers mentally, including: * a three-digit number and 1s * a three-digit number and 10s * a three-digit number and 100s | It’s important that children are exposed to a range of strategies to be able to do this and be shown that we can use these strategies to check answers to questions. | Mental Addition and Subtraction Plus and Minus Dice Card Calculations |
| Add and subtract numbers with up to 3 digits, using formal written methods of columnar addition and subtraction. | Children use their understanding of place value and partitioning and practise using columnar addition and subtraction with increasingly large numbers up to 3 digits. It’s important that children start with concrete resources to build understanding, moving onto pictorial representations and then the abstract. | Exchange Shop Calculate and Score – Column Addition Calculate and Find Highest Total |
| Estimate the answer to a calculation and use inverse operations to check answers. | Children will be expected to estimate answers to addition and subtraction problems before working out the answers accurately. Rounding is one of the main methods to do this. Children should also be taught that addition and subtraction are inverse operations and that they can use the inverse to check the answer to their calculations. | Estimation Tic Tac Toe Inverse Operation |
| Solve problems, including missing number problems, using number facts, place value, and more complex addition and subtraction. | Children will need to be able to choose a method that they have learnt to solve a problem. They will also need to check their answer using a different method. Children should be supported to explain how they have solved a problem and why they have chosen a particular method. Using pictures and symbols can be a good way to explain a thought process. | Maths Story Dice Match the Vocab Word Problem Puzzle |