How to tutor a 3rd grader in reading: a five-minute check that shows what to work on, the 30-minute session plan, what to do for decoding, fluency, vocabulary and comprehension, the third-grade fluency numbers, and how to tell after six weeks that it is working

Third grade is the year reading changes jobs. Until now your child has been learning to read. From fourth grade the school assumes they can, and uses reading to teach science, social studies and the word problems in math. A third grader who reads slowly or without understanding falls behind in everything at once, and that is why this is the year parents start looking for help. This page shows how to do it yourself, or how to tell whether a tutor is doing it properly.

Why third grade

Two facts explain the pressure. A long-term study of nearly 4,000 students, published by the Annie E. Casey Foundation in 2011, found that children who were not proficient readers by the end of third grade were four times more likely to leave high school without a diploma. And several states, including Florida and Mississippi, have laws under which a third grader who does not pass the state reading test can be held back.

Neither fact means a struggling eight-year-old is in trouble for life. They mean this is the cheapest year to fix it.

First, a five-minute check

Reading is four skills stacked on each other. Tutoring the wrong one wastes months. Take a page from a third-grade book the child has not seen, about 150 words.

1. Ask the child to read aloud for exactly one minute. Follow on your own copy and put a mark over every word that is wrong or skipped. Do not correct.
2. Count the words read correctly. That is words correct per minute.
3. Work out accuracy: words correct divided by words attempted.
4. Ask three questions: what was it about, what happened first, and one "why" question.

The benchmarks for step 2, from the Hasbrouck and Tindal oral reading fluency norms (2017), for a child at the 50th percentile:

On accuracy, the usual guide is that 95 percent or better means the text is easy enough to read alone, 90 to 94 percent is right for reading with help, and below 90 percent the text is too hard and should be swapped for an easier one.

The 30-minute session

Three or four times a week. The same order every time, so the child knows what is coming.

Change the proportions to fit the check. A child with a decoding problem gets ten minutes of word work and a shorter new text. A child with a comprehension problem gets ten minutes of talk.

What to do for each of the four

Decoding. Third graders who guess at words are usually missing specific patterns: vowel teams (ea, oa, ai, ou), r-controlled vowels (ar, or, er, ir, ur), silent e, and above all long words. Teach one pattern a week with ten words. For long words, teach the child to break them: find the vowels, split between consonants, read each part, blend. "Fan-tas-tic." Keep a list of the words missed in reading and use those.

Fluency. Repeated reading aloud with guidance is the fluency method with the strongest research support; the National Reading Panel reviewed it in 2000. Take a passage of 100 to 150 words at a level the child reads with 95 percent accuracy. Read it to them once with expression. They read it; you time one minute and count. They read it again the next day and the day after. Speed goes up within the week and the gain carries over to new texts. Reading together in one voice, and taking turns by sentence, both help a hesitant reader.

Vocabulary. Before the new text, pick three words the child may not know and explain each in a sentence. After reading, ask the child to use each one. Then read to the child from a book two years above their own level for ten minutes at bedtime: most of the vocabulary of a good reader comes from being read to and from reading a lot, not from lists.

Comprehension. Stop after each paragraph and ask "what just happened?" If they cannot say, reread it together. Then ask one "how do you know?" question and have the child put a finger on the sentence that proves it. Third-grade state tests ask exactly this: the answer, and the evidence. Finish with a three-sentence retelling: first, then, finally.

Choosing the text

Most failed home tutoring uses a book that is too hard. Use the five-finger test: the child reads one page and raises a finger for each word they cannot read. Zero or one, it is easy and good for fluency practice. Two or three, it is right for reading together. Four or five, put it back.

Let the child choose the topic. A child who cares about sharks will work harder at a shark book than at a better book about anything else. Mix stories with non-fiction: third-grade tests use both.

Six mistakes to avoid

1. Correcting every word instantly. Wait three seconds; give the first sound; then tell them and move on.
2. Saying "sound it out" for every word. Some words (said, could, through) do not sound out. Just tell them.
3. Comprehension questions for a child who cannot yet read the words. Fix the lower skill first.
4. Sessions of an hour. Stamina runs out at about thirty minutes, and the last half teaches dislike.
5. Only silent reading. You cannot hear the mistakes.
6. Taking away books they enjoy because they are "too easy". Easy reading in volume is how fluency grows.

How to tell it is working

Every two weeks, repeat the one-minute read on a new grade-level passage and write down the number. A typical third grader gains about one word per minute a week across the year; a child getting focused practice four times a week often gains faster. After six weeks you should see three things: a higher words-per-minute figure, fewer guessed words, and a child who picks up a book without being asked at least sometimes.

If after six to eight weeks of steady work the numbers have not moved, the decoding errors look random, or the child still confuses common small words, ask the school in writing for a reading evaluation. Persistent difficulty with accurate word reading despite good teaching is the pattern of dyslexia, and that needs a structured literacy specialist; see online tutoring for dyslexia and the types of tutors for which kind to look for.

Hiring a tutor instead

Ask four things: what will you do in the first session to find out what my child cannot do; will you hear my child read aloud every session; how will you measure progress; and what will you send me afterwards. A tutor who starts with the one-minute read and shows you the number is doing it properly. What a third-grade tutor costs is in 3rd grade tutoring cost.

Where to get help

A 1-on-1 online reading comprehension class with a master's-qualified English tutor, the same one every week: the five-minute check in the first class, the 30-minute routine above built around what it shows, the text on a shared screen so the tutor sees every word the child reads, and the words-per-minute figure sent to you every two weeks with the recording. The free 30-minute first class is a real lesson.

Questions parents ask

See how we teach this, 1-on-1 online →