This month in LEDP is sadly the last month, but the kiddos have been getting super excited for summer and telling us all about their future summer adventures! We have been wrapping up the year with some fun projects and also more outside/gym time. Sonnae led a few design projects centered around fashion! We had a few days where a lot of our 3rd graders decided to make clothes out of felt and fabric we had left over from our end of the year project. Our fashion designers were helping each other make aprons, capes, cloaks, headbands and even little stuffies! There was a small fashion show to show off their creativity whilst also singing along to songs from Wicked! 

Some of our third graders  have been updating us on their days with small comic books they draw collectively called “Bloopers of the Day.” They will make a six page comic book covering funny things that happened to them and their friends throughout the day. They have also been branching out and creating comics about characters they create and writing stories to go along with their characters. When our comic book artists are not creating their material, they love to go to the big gym and play this new game they created. It is a cross between soccer, volleyball and water polo (minus the water). One of them is the goalie, while the other ones hit the ball with their hands instead of feet. They can only shoot to score if they stand up, but all other times in the game they have to shuffle around on their knees. It seems like a pretty tough game, but our athletes are excited to play it each day! The 2024-2025 school year has been great! It was a pleasure getting to know each and every third grader this year and connecting with all of them throughout the year! Thank you so much and we hope you have a wonderful summer break! We’ll see you next year!

This month in LEDP third grade got very excited for our highly anticipated Walk-A-Thon! The kiddos got hyped up to decorate many different posters to hang along the track for the fundraiser! It was such an amazing day-especially third grade- they helped out the younger kiddos while also being wonderful role models for them. The upper grades did spectacular in their roles as helpers facilitating face painting and handing out snacks. Overall, it was an amazing day for everyone involved! Thank you to everyone who donated and supported us along the way!

In the week after the Walk A Thon, third grade settled in nicely back to normalcy. Homework time has been going very well as the year winds down, many students needing less help with homework as the reality of fourth grade sets in. During free choice time, a lot of our kiddos have asked to go to the gym and play pool noodle tag! It is so funny to see so many kids running around with pool noodles, racing after each other to see who will be it next. After tag, the boys will usually go back to playing soccer, transitioning to outside and building different soccer teams with other grades on the field. Third grade tried to build robots as well one day, which then turned into building different creatures and monsters out of the various materials we had- such as, cotton balls, styrofoam, paper tubes, pom poms, straws and toothpicks. 

This month third grade has been enjoying being back from April break! It was so fun to listen to everyone’s stories about their break- many were excited to share their stories on the eclectic list of places our world travelers visited such as, Paris, Las Vegas, The Grand Canyon, Cape Cod, Florida, Arizona, Chicago, Ohio and Vermont! Even friends that stayed local shared their own versions of exploration- excited to tell us about how  the MFA, Coolidge Corner and The Arnold Arboretum! In the following weeks since break the kiddos have really been enjoying making creations out of beads like lizards, snakes, ice cream cones and custom friendship bracelets! The girls have been decorating and designing bracelets for their friends, writing silly words or others names on them and sharing them! Some of them also made bracelets for Sonnae and I which we have put on our ID tags or wrists and worn them everyday! 

Also this month third grade has been excited everyday to get outside and enjoy the sunshine! The weather (excluding weekends) has been amazing! We played a big third grade kickball game and everyone enjoyed playing against one another, trying to catch the ball for outs and kicking it as far as they could. Now that the field is open, the boys love to play soccer on the open nets- often sharing the field with the second graders. They love to play World Cup or fully scrimmige games against other groups. The girls have been very interested in finding worms in the ground or making some mud sculptures with flowers pressed onto them, and little rocks for decoration; they are so creative! We also have created sculptures out of clay inside on rainy days, we have hot glued them to make bigger, more extravagant ones! Overall third grade has had a wonderful start to May and we are all excited for the Walk-A-Thon!

This month in LEDP, third grade has done quite a few different activities! We started off the month with a good old game of trivia! Mostly everyone participated and worked well together, forming teams of two or three to answer questions about US history or Greek mythology. Afterwards we started a magnetic science experiment, testing to see what liquids would be too thick or too thin to pull a paperclip through it with a magnet. We used dish soap, water, shampoo and shaving cream! It did not take long for the kids to ditch the experiment and start playing with the shaving cream. Another day went by and the kiddos decided of their own choosing to create popsicle stick structures! We had different kids make bird houses, others made boats and others just decided to color the sticks different colors and use them as bookmarks!

With April here it means we are spending more time outside! Even though lately it has been quite rainy, on the days it is nice and sunny outside, we venture out most of the day and third grade has found many different activities to do. The girls have found interest in making mud pies or mud structures on the pavement, decorating them with budding flowers or small rocks to make little worm homes! They also decided to go hunting for worms one day, finding some and looking at them closely with sticks, intrigued by the little wiggly creatures and putting them back in their homes. The field has now opened and the kiddos are ecstatic! The boys are excited to play soccer again with real soccer goals and the girls enjoy chasing the birds on the field or poking at puddles with sticks. Overall April has been going well for third grade and we hope to keep up the energy after we return from April break!

Through the second half of March third grade has been quite active! We have played large group games in the gym such as soccer or doctor dodgeball. We have been focusing on what sportsmanship looks and sounds like. We did a relay race with two separate teams racing around the track outside. It really ignited some kids' competitive spirit! During choice time, we have been doing some fun science experiments! We did a “can color disappear?” experiment; Allison filled four different cups with water and added red to one cup, blue to another, yellow to another and green to the last one. The kids guessed which colors they thought would disappear completely and which ones would just fade. The outcome was super cool! We also made some air dry clay sculptures led by Sonnae and the next day painted them to take home! The kiddos seem to love the activities, but also loved going outside in the warm spring weather!  

Since our reward system has been going so well- everyone has gotten their sticker charts filled! We decided to have a movie party with popcorn in the LEDP room to celebrate! We watched Despicable Me 4 with all the lights off, comfy seats and two huge bags of popcorn! It was a lovely Friday celebration and hopefully another one will be coming soon!