At St. Paul School, the third graders receive First Eucharist; therefore, the curriculum stresses the Eucharist, the Mass, the Church and our part in it. The reading curriculum includes all the skills necessary for comprehension and full enjoyment of literature. We use the Scott Foresman Reading Series Imagine That and Picture This. On Fridays, we explore reading, interpretation of, appreciation of and writing poetry. Handwriting is an important part of each day, as we use cursive exclusively from January on. The vocabulary program is based on Sadlier-Oxford Vocabulary Workshop. Three days a week, we use the Won Way Phonics Program to improve pronunciation and spelling. The Language Arts Program consists of a writing portion and a grammar portion. In mathematics, we use the Sadlier-Oxford Progress in Mathematics. We review place value, rounding and estimation. Addition and subtraction are extended to five digits with regrouping. Multiplication and division are introduced and problem solving with word problems are used to strengthen thinking and reasoning skills. Measurement, time, geometry and fractions are used in problem solving. The text for science is McGraw-Hill, but is supplemented by literature and much hands-on experimentation using the scientific method as a guide. Houghton Mifflin Share Our World is the text for social studies, with communities as the basic theme. Social studies is also heavily supplemented by a literature-based program.