NZ Curriculum · Phase 1 (Years 0–3)

What your child learns in Year 3 Maths

Year 3 sits in the foundations phase — number sense, early patterns, measuring, shapes, and first steps with data. Below is every skill the refreshed New Zealand Curriculum (2025) expects a Year 3 student to practise — 47 objectives across 5 strands — exactly as our tutors track them.

Number

Number structures
  • Reading and writing whole numbers up to 1,000, and representing them using base 10 structure
  • Comparing and ordering whole numbers up to 1,000
  • Recognising the place value of each digit in a three-digit number
  • Finding the total number of objects beyond 120 by first separating them into groups (e.g. groups of 10 or 100)
  • Rounding numbers to the nearest 10 or 100
  • Estimating the answer to a calculation
  • Counting forwards and backwards in 2s, 3s, 4s, 5s, and 8s from multiples of these numbers (e.g. 20, 15, 10, 5; 8, 16, 24, 32)
  • Counting forwards and backwards in 10s and 100s from any whole number between 0 and 1000
Operations
  • Finding the complement of a number to 100 (e.g. 34 + __ = 100)
  • Adding and subtracting numbers up to 1000 (e.g. 329 + 3, 329 + 80, 329 − 200, 137 + 54)
  • Solving one-step addition and subtraction problems involving numbers up to 1000
  • Solving multi-step addition and subtraction problems involving numbers up to 100
  • Multiplying or dividing using equal sharing, grouping, repeated addition or subtraction, or known facts
  • Memorising multiplication and corresponding division facts for 2s, 3s, 4s, 5s, 8s, and 10s
  • Multiplying a one- or two-digit number by a one-digit number (e.g. 4 × 6; 2 × 23)
  • Dividing whole numbers by a one-digit divisor with no remainders (e.g. 24 ÷ 3, 32 ÷ 4)
Rational numbers
  • Reading, writing, and representing fractions of sets, quantities, and measurements on a number line, and of regions, using small denominators
  • Counting in unit fractions up to 1
  • Comparing unit fractions with denominators up to 12
  • Comparing non-unit fractions with the same denominator up to 12
  • Identifying when two fractions are equivalent, using representations
  • Adding and subtracting fractions with the same denominator within a whole (e.g. 1 — 8 + 2 — 8 + 3 — 8 = 6 — 8 )
  • Finding a unit fraction of a whole number by connecting to division (e.g. 1 — 3 of 15 is found by 15 ÷ 3)
  • Finding the whole when given a unit fraction by connecting to repeated addition or multiplication (e.g. if 1 — 4 of a set is 3, the whole set is 4 × 3 = 12)
Financial mathematics
  • Representing currency values of mixed dollars and cents without using decimal notation (e.g. $2 and 50 cents)
  • Making amounts of money using one- and two-dollar coins and 5-, 10-, 20-, 50-, and 100-dollar notes
  • Using addition and subtraction to give change

Algebra

Equations and relationships
  • Checking the truth of number sentences involving direct comparisons of whole numbers up to 1,000 (e.g. 313 < 330, true or false?)
  • Checking the truth of number sentences and completing open number sentences involving addition, subtraction, multiplication, or division (e.g. 217 − __ = 105, 12 ÷ 3 = 5 − 2,true or false?)
  • Recognising, continuing, and creating growing number patterns

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Measurement

Measuring
  • Estimating and measuring length (cm and m), mass (g and kg), and capacity (mL and L), using tools with labelled markings and whole-number metric units
  • Comparing and ordering objects using whole-number metric units of length, mass, or capacity
  • Measuring the perimeter of polygon using metric units
  • Measuring the area of rectangles using squares of equal size
  • Turning an object or person and describing how far they have turned, using full, half, quarter, and three-quarter turns as benchmarks
  • Identifying the duration of events using years, months, weeks, days, hours, minutes, and seconds
  • Telling the time on analogue and digital clocks to the nearest 5 minutes and the nearest minute, using the language of minutes past the hour and to the hour
  • Describing the differences in duration between units of time (e.g. days vs weeks, months vs years)

Geometry

Shapes
  • Identifying, describing, visualising and sorting regular polygons with up to 10 sides
Spatial reasoning
  • Recognising lines of symmetry in patterns or pictures, and creating or completing symmetrical patterns or pictures
Pathways
  • Following and creating a sequence of step-by-step instructions for moving people or objects to a different location, including half and quarter turns and the distance to be travelled
  • Using simple maps to locate objects and places relative to other objects and places.

Statistics

Developing knowledge from data
  • Collecting categorical data and sorting the responses
  • Collecting numerical data by asking an investigative question with a response that is a count or a discrete measurement (i.e. a whole number) (e.g. How many teeth have been lost by the students in our class? What are the shoe sizes in the class?)
Visualisation of data
  • Creating data visualisations for categorical and numerical data
Interpretation of data
  • Describing data visualisations using the variable name and the context and giving the frequency for each category or number
  • Answering questions about data visualisations, including which category has the most or least items and questions involving operations (e.g. How many teeth did our class lose in total?)

Want help getting there? Vertex Academy runs small-group Study Hubs in Avondale — one $59/week membership, aligned to these curriculum objectives, first session free.

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Learning objectives sourced from the New Zealand Curriculum (Mathematics and Statistics, 2025) © Ministry of Education, licensed under CC BY 4.0. Vertex Academy is not affiliated with or endorsed by the Ministry of Education.