Extension Questions | Addition And Subtraction | Year 3

Deepen and develop your Year 3 pupils' understanding of addition and subtraction with these extension questions.

These 20 extension questions have been designed to allow pupils to go further in their understanding of addition and subtraction with a range of reasoning and problem solving questions.

This resource can be used as part of an extension activity for individual pupils or pairs or as part of a whole class discussion. Some teachers also set the extension questions as a homework activity or to provide additional challenges outside the classroom.

For those taking a maths mastery approach to teaching within a mixed ability class these extension questions are invaluable at allowing all pupils to work towards mastery of addition and subtraction.

This resource was created in response to teachers wanting more interesting and complex questions for their pupils, but also knowing that these questions take a long time to create.

We’ve now done the work so you don’t have to!

Suitable to use with mastery schemes such as White Rose.

What to expect from these Year 3 addition and subtraction extension questions:

• Identifying the odd one out in a set of addition and subtraction problems.
• Spotting and explaining mistakes in subtraction calculations.
• Discussing the efficiency of different methods for solving subtraction problems.
• Determining whether regrouping is needed when adding a 1-digit number to a 3-digit number.
• Creating addition or subtraction questions to match a given answer.
• Writing various calculations for a given bar model in addition and subtraction.
• Drawing pictorial representations of addition problems.
• Spotting and explaining errors in addition calculations.
• Estimating answers to addition problems and discussing the usefulness of estimation in checking calculations.
• Creating word problems based on given addition calculations.