This month in third grade has been filled with fun, laughs and big smiles! We have implemented some new building tools out of little paper cups! A lot of our girls took to them almost immediately and built what they call “The Great Wall of LEDP.” It took them multiple tries and multiple different teams of kiddos, but they achieved their goal of making the biggest wall of paper cups they could! When that eventually fell they did not hesitate to build it again, stacking it on the ground so they could build it even taller! Naturally the girls decided to call it, “The Great Wall of LEDP 2” since it was the second building of the great wall!

Also this month, winter has been giving us a lot of snow which means everyone had fun playing in it in LEDP! During outside time, a lot of third graders rushed to the field to continue building snow forts they started during school recess. They grabbed whatever they could find to haul snow over to the structures to build it up, creating doors to forts, tunnels underneath forts, and walls to build the forts. It has been a very creative month for third grade, whether that be with building materials inside, or creating building materials outside! 

We hope that everyone has a wonderful break and we can't wait to see you all in February's last week!

This month third grade has been getting into a lot of board games! Everyday they ask each other if anyone wants to play Out Foxed, a team game where you try to guess through clues on who  the thief is! A lot of the third graders love it and seem to play nicely with one another! Third grade has also been a fan of some of the new games we received, such as Magnetism, a game where you try to avoid connecting all the magnets together which is much harder than you’d think! They also enjoy playing this memorization game of finding numbers 1-12 in order by flipping them over, memorizing the order and taking turns. 

Aside from board games, third grade has spent a lot of time inside because outside has been so cold! On the days we have stayed inside, groups of kids have made many different creations out of magnatiles such as castles, houses, forts, and racetracks! For those who chose not to build, we end up going to the gym and running around in large games of dodgeball. They love to play kids against teacher such as, all of the kids throwing dodgeballs at Allison and Allison deflecting them back. It is such a joy to see everyone smiling and running around until their faces are beet red, kicking dodgeballs out of the way, and plopping down on the ground smiling tiredly. We are looking forward to what February will bring for third grade!

January has been a very exciting time of year for third grade! Everyone was so excited to come back to school in 2025, and tell us all about their two week vacation break. Many kids went away for break and told us stories about their trips to Korea, Dominican Republic, New York, and other places. Many kids were bubbling with excitement to tell us what they received for Hanukkah or Christmas, animatedly describing the video games they played, food they ate, and family they saw. 

Meanwhile, third grade has been consistently getting better at listening, doing homework on time, and cleaning up from activities. The new sticker reward system has been going really well, some kids even reaching the prize twice now. Many of the boys are enjoying playing football together, taking turns catching and running the ball and trying to score a touchdown. While other boys have fun playing basketball together, trying to guard one another when shooting and taking deep three point shots. The girls love to trade little squishy things, pencils, erasers, and stickers with each other in the cafeteria while they eat their snack and chat. Overall, third grade is having a fabulous start to the year! Can’t wait to see where more months will bring us!

This month in LEDP third grade has done a lot of sporty activity! During gym time you can often find the girls rooting for each other doing gymnastics, and the boys playing catch with footballs while others play basketball. Many of the girls teach each other different gymnastics moves and help one another in trying to get better. They have been timing themselves on how long they can hold a handstand and cheering for one another when they beat their personal best. Also in the gym, the boys have been competing in friendly games of soccer and basketball. They have been playing Knockout where they shoot the ball into the hoop and whoever gets the ball in first, the other one is out. They also play games of thunder with the soccer ball, where they shoot the ball into the goal while shouting the country they represent on the field. 

In return third grade has implemented a new reward system; the sticker chart! Instead of our old system where everyone had to work together to work towards a common goal, we now reward each student individually. This system has turned out to be a smashing success! Everyone tries to help eachother out and receive as many stickers as they can. Boys and girls are playing well together and keeping hands off and to themselves. We look forward to see who is the first one to get the most stickers!

Wrapping up the month of October, third grade made sparkly potions while listening to Halloween music to get into the spirit of trick or treating! Every child in the whole school was elated to get candy in their adorable costumes. As third grade waited to get picked up with friends to get buckets of candy, kids stirred their potions and pretended to be witches. Starting off November, third grade dove into harvest themed crafts and the changes of daylight savings. Our first craft was creating our favorite pieces of pie out of paper plates, then creating those into paper plate pie garlands! Our next project was run by our newest member Sonnae! She had the kiddos pick out different colored pieces of felt and then created name pennants! Various friends made many pennants for themselves, siblings, parents, and teachers. 

In November we have had a few early release days, within those days we have done fun trivia games and we got to pet alligators! We had the Rainforest Reptile show come and present various reptilians to our kiddos. We learned about the difference between alligators and crocodiles, tortoises and turtles, and how big snakes can grow! After the show we all went outside and some of the third graders created their own landscaping business! November has been full of falling leaves and fun crafts, onto the next!

Kicking off the middle of the month was the beloved Japanese Fair! All of the third graders were so excited to get their highly sought after ice pops and rice balls! Everyone had their tickets in hand ready to play the fish scooping game and buy fun Pokemon crafts and origami. Soon enough all of the ice pops were gone, and candy necklaces worn and eaten, ready to move onto the bakery table to eat all of the brownies. After all of the kids were full of sweets and fun, they were happy to come back inside to play games and read until their parents picked them up.

The rest of the month was filled with Halloween themed art projects and getting to know our new third grade teacher Sonnae! We made 3D haunted landscapes out of paper plates, along with ping pong ball Jack- o'-lanterns! For a few days a lot of the kids took it upon themselves to make their very own little houses again; they made lampshades out of paper plates and beds out of cotton balls, drawing little windows and rugs on their walls and floors. Sonnae ran her first art project with them and it went amazingly! The kids loved making their own faux jack o lanterns trying to copy Sonnae’s wonderful example. She also ran a pumpkin/Frankenstein drawing project and the kids loved it! The girls loved to make their spooky pumpkins just in time for Halloween! 

Third grade is excitedly entering the spooky month of October! We have a ton of fun projects planned around the Halloween theme; watercolor Halloween characters, tea light planets, ooblek slime and Halloween costume designing! We have also been doing other projects on the not so spooky side; third grade experimented with different fruits and their acidity levels by putting baking soda on them. They loved to smoosh the baking soda into the fruit to see which ones fizzed! They all were excited to see what would happen with the pumpkin I provided. Kids squashed lemons and limes into the pumpkin to activate the baking soda- at the end it looked like a fun and messy Halloween centerpiece!

Another one of the projects we did was run by Jaylise. She created little paper stuffies of cows, pigs, sheep, and chickens! It was so cute to see everyone running around with their own little paper pet. They also loved her attempt at making ooblek, although it turned into super colorful slime with shaving cream and flour! Jaylise created a lot of great projects with them throughout the first month of school and they all enjoyed her work as did we. It was amazingly fun to have her at LEDP, the kids loved to ask her about her tasks in the army and what she has done for the country. We thank her for her service and her time at LEDP, we all wish her well!

We've had so much fun celebrating the new Fall season and look forward to the next spooky weeks to follow! Also please be on the lookout for more information via email on one of four of our Open Houses this year!

Third grade is having a great start to the new year! Over the past two weeks, the children have been settling into and learning our daily routines, practicing our group expectations, and getting to know our new staff member Jaylise! We are all working nicely in the new space, the cafeteria! Jaylise created a wonderful little seating chart for homework and reading time, which has translated really well into quiet reading and friendships. The kids have shown us as each day passes that they can surpass our expectations and foster a respectful, cooperative, and lively community in third grade.

It has been an interesting few starting weeks in the LEDP third grade. Jaylise got called away by her own army duties in the military! While we wait for her to return safely we have our very own Gus back with us for two weeks! The kids were so happy and excited to see their old LEDP teacher sitting waiting for them as a total surprise on a normal Monday afternoon. In the meantime we have created some pretty cool projects! We created our very own fossils from model magic and tiny dinosaur figurines. Everyone was so excited to use model magic and paint it, they even used markers on some to create different colored clays. Also in classic Gus fashion, he constructed a “build your own room” diorama. The kids spent quite a few days drawing, cutting, and building their very own rooms. All of them are so full of creativity and color that can only be described as a Gus LEDP project.

We love that 3rd grade has jumped right in and we anticipate another amazing year in LEDP!