Newsletter September 8-11, 2026

📰 Early Light Academy – 3rd Grade Newsletter

Week of September 4-11, 2026

🌟 Dear Families,

This year at ELA, we are taking our students on a Journey to a Phoenix. 

“As an ELA Phoenix, with a growing understanding of my place in history, I can develop the Attributes, Skills, and Knowledge that fuel my journey to be a lifelong learner and inspiring leader.”

We will move through the year learning and sharing what it takes to be a Phoenix. Already, we have a competition in the lunchroom and at recess to show how we can become a Phoenix.

We are working toward earning stars for our class when students demonstrate RISE throughout the day. Once our class reaches 15 stars, we will celebrate with a special class reward! ⭐

📚 Reading 

We are switching gears to learn more about realistic fiction and ponder the question, “What can traditions teach you about cultures? What traditions does your family celebrate? What special foods do you prepare? Are there songs, stories, holidays, or celebrations that are important to your family? How does your culture contribute to your community?

During our stories this week, we will look into character perspectives and character development through stories. One of the challenges students will face is to find the author’s purpose for writing these stories. 

📚 Wonders Unit 1, Week 3: Wonders Unit 1 Week 3

🏠 Home Reading: 20 Minutes Every Day

Our expectation is that students read for a minimum of 20 minutes each day at home. Reading can look different for every child! Students may:

• Read independently.

• Read aloud to you.

• Take turns reading with you.

• Read to a sibling.

• Read to a stuffed animal. 🧸

Even 20 minutes of reading each day can make a tremendous difference. Consistent reading helps students build vocabulary, strengthen comprehension, develop fluency, and become more confident readers. It also provides an opportunity for children to discover new ideas, explore different worlds, and develop a lifelong love of reading.

Thank you for supporting your child’s reading journey at home! ❤️

📝 Grammar Focus 

This week in Grammar, we will be working with Subjects. Subjects are extremely important to add to sentences, as they tell us who the sentence is about. Students will add subjects to a sentence to complete it, as well as correct sentences so the sentence makes sense. We will also focus on adding subjects in our writing this week.

✍️  Writing Focus 

This week in writing, we will continue to focus on writing about a time in our life that was difficult and how we overcame that. Students will also work on a creative writing piece, making sure to include subjects in their sentences while adding predicates along with it. We will continue to build our foundation of a 5-sentence paragraph.

🔬Science Spotlight

This week in Science, we are continuing our unit about weather patterns. In this lesson, students explore seasonal weather conditions across different regions. They investigate how weather patterns can be used to make predictions about future weather. In the activity, Snow Fort Weather, students organize daily temperature data from three snowy towns into a table so that they can compare weather conditions and predict which town is most likely to have the best weather for a snow fort festival next year.

🔢 Math Corner:

This week, we will finish up with a hands-on rounding activity. After that, we will move into 3-digit adding and subtracting with regrouping! This is a very important topic and place value must be followed to be successful. Remind your students to stack their numbers by place value and write carefully so they can read what they do. We are seeing great effort in Math class! Encourage them to keep persevering!

🔠 Spelling Words- 

We will now be focusing on words with the silent e. A word spelled with a vowel, consonant, and final e usually has a long vowel sound. You can hear a long a in late, a long i in invite, and a long o in alone. The final e in these words is silent.

date

lake

skate

plane

grade

fine

life

rice

wise

smile

rose

globe

smoke

come

used

step

rock

luck

sneeze

stripe

white

📚 Vocabulary Words

• Celebrate- do something special for an important event

• Courage- bravery in a difficult situation

• Disappointment- feeling of sadness because something is not as good as expected

• Precious- very valuable to a person

• Pride- a feeling of satisfaction in something you have done

• Remind- make a person remember something

• Symbols- a thing that represents ideas or objects

• Traditions- things that have been done for a long time

• 📅 Important Dates

• September 7, 2026: Labor Day NO SCHOOL

• September. 8, 2026- Fall Pictures for students- students must be in school uniform

• September 24-25, 2026: Fall Conferences

• September 28, 2026: Teacher Comp Day, NO SCHOOL

Newsletter- August 31- Sept. 4

📰 Early Light Academy – 3rd Grade Newsletter

Week of August 31- September 4, 2026

🌟 Dear Families,

Last week was busy and productive! We spent time reviewing classroom procedures and expectations while also diving into new content across our different subject areas. We recognize that some students may have experienced the “summer slide,” which is when students forget or need to refresh some of the skills they learned previously. We worked hard to reactivate those skills and remember what we learned in second grade.

This week, we will continue emphasizing our school-wide RISE expectations: Respectful, Inclusive, Safe, and Engaged. We are working toward earning stars for our class when students demonstrate RISE throughout the day. Once our class reaches 15 stars, we will celebrate with a special class reward! ⭐

📚 Reading 

This week in reading, we will continue learning about narrative nonfiction. Our focus question is: How do people from different cultures contribute to a community? We would love for you to continue this conversation at home! Take some time to share your family’s culture and traditions with your child. You might talk about:

What traditions does your family celebrate?

What special foods do you prepare?

Are there songs, stories, holidays, or celebrations that are important to your family?

How does your culture contribute to your community?

These conversations are a wonderful way for students to make connections between what they are learning at school and their own lives and experiences.

📚 Wonders Unit 1, Week 2: Wonders Unit 1 Week 2

🏠 Home Reading: 20 Minutes Every Day

Our expectation is that students read for a minimum of 20 minutes each day at home. Reading can look different for every child! Students may:

• Read independently.

• Read aloud to you.

• Take turns reading with you.

• Read to a sibling.

• Read to a stuffed animal. 🧸

Even 20 minutes of reading each day can make a tremendous difference. Consistent reading helps students build vocabulary, strengthen comprehension, develop fluency, and become more confident readers. It also provides an opportunity for children to discover new ideas, explore different worlds, and develop a lifelong love of reading.

Thank you for supporting your child’s reading journey at home! ❤️

📝 Grammar Focus 

This week in grammar, we are focusing on commands and exclamations. A command is important to use when telling someone what to do. An exclamation will show strong feelings and emotions. Discuss with your child the difference of when we use each of these types within sentences and why they are important.

✍️  Writing Focus 

This week we will be working on writing about something that has been difficult for students to do in their lives. We will be working on creating a strong topic sentence, and then adding the steps that they took when it was a hard thing for them to do. After adding in our topic sentence and three steps, we will finish with a strong concluding sentence to wrap up our writing. The goal for this year in third grade is a strong five-sentence paragraph.

🔬Science Spotlight

This week in Science, we are continuing our unit about weather patterns. We will learn how to predict when it's going to storm. Great timing for this wild weather we're having!

🔢 Math Corner:

We are jumping into rounding this week! In 3rd grade, students learn to round to the nearest ten and hundred. You can help at home by asking between which two tens or hundreds a number falls. For instance: 37. Which two tens is this between? 30 and 40. Because 37 is past the midpoint (35), it rounds up to 40. Encourage your students to persevere!

🔠 Spelling Words- 

This week we will review words with short 3,  short o, and short u sounds. If your student got a 4 on the pretest that they took today, they will not need to take the posttest on Friday. If your student didn’t get a 4, please practice the spelling words all week long. They will take the posttest on Friday to show what they have learned.

step

mess

head

crops

stop

rock

clock

sock

pond

jumps

shut

luck

slump

bugs

mug

clap

sick

snack

ready

does

said

📚 Vocabulary Words

• Scared- afraid of something

• Admires- likes

• Classmate- someone who is in your class at school

• Community- a place where people live, work, and play together

• Contribute- give money or help  

• Practicing- doing something again and again to get better

• Pronounce- say the sounds correctly

• Tumbled- fall

📅 Important Dates

• August 31, 2026.-Early Light Academy will be conducting hearing and speech screenings starting on Monday. The  Utah State Board of Education requires hearing screenings each year for all third-grade students.

• September 4, 2026- Spirit Dress Day

• September 4, 2026- Early Release at 1:00 pm

• September 7, 2026 Labor Day NO SCHOOL

• September. 8, 2026- Fall Pictures for students

• September 24-25, 2026: Fall Conferences

• September 28, 2026: Teacher Comp Day NO SCHOOL

Thank you for partnering with us as we begin this exciting school year. We are off to a great start, and I can't wait to see what this amazing group of third graders accomplishes together!

Newsletter Monday, August 24, 2026

📰 Early Light Academy – 3rd Grade Newsletter

Week of August 24-28, 2026

🌟 Dear Families,

We had a wonderful first week! It has been so much fun watching our students come together and begin building our classroom family. We participated in many activities designed to help us get to know one another, and it has already been exciting to see students making new friends and showing kindness to one another. I am so proud of the way they are beginning to care for and support each other!

Our first week included many procedures, expectations, and routines as we learned what it means to be a successful third-grade classroom. We used the RISE framework to talk about what respectful, inclusive, safe, and engaged behavior looks and sounds like in different situations. We also learned a new acronym: KYHFOOTY—Keep Your Hands, Feet, and Other Objects To Yourself! Now, I can simply say “KYHFOOTY,” and students know exactly what I mean. 😊

🏔️ The Power of the Yeti: Growing Through Challenges

This year, we are focusing on growth—not just academic growth or physical growth (and I have a feeling these third graders are going to experience plenty of that!), but also growth in our confidence, skills, and ability to persevere when things get hard.

We talked about the Power of the Yeti and how there may be things we can't do “yeti”—but that doesn't mean we can't learn to do them! Each student chose something they would like to improve or get better at this year. Some students chose an academic goal, while others chose something physical or personal.

We talked about what happens when we encounter something difficult and how important it is to keep trying, ask for help, and believe that we can grow.

I shared a personal experience with the students as an example of perseverance. Five years ago, I was diagnosed with breast cancer. It was an incredibly difficult time in my life. I went through multiple surgeries, chemotherapy—including losing all of my hair—and radiation. I had many difficult days, but I kept moving forward, one step at a time. Today, I am doing very well.

I wanted my students to understand that hard things don't have to stop us. Sometimes we need to take a deep breath, try again, ask for help, or simply remind ourselves that we are still learning.

Ask your student what they chose as their goal this year and how they can use the Power of the Yeti when they encounter something challenging. I hope this becomes a reminder we can return to throughout the year: “I can't do it yet, but I can keep growing!”

📋 Student Code of Conduct

Many of you have already returned the Student Code of Conduct form—thank you! I am still missing a few, however. If you haven't yet had a chance to sit down with your student and discuss the expectations together, please do so over the weekend. After discussing the form, please have your student initial it and return it to me on Monday.

Students who returned their forms by today will receive PBIS (Positive Behavioral Interventions and Supports) points as a reward for being responsible and getting this important task completed.

I have also linked the Student Code of Conduct forms on my classroom website under the Helpful Links page for easy access.

📖 Reading Focus: Narrative Nonfiction

This week, we officially begin our reading curriculum, Wonders! Our first unit focuses on personal achievements and new experiences with the essential question:

“How do experiences help us grow?”

Students will explore texts such as Gary the Dreamer while building important foundational phonics and spelling skills, including working with short-vowel patterns.

As we begin studying narrative nonfiction, students will learn how this type of text combines real-life information with storytelling. We will explore:

📚 What makes a text narrative nonfiction

🗺️ Text features such as headings, maps, and other informational elements

🧩 How authors organize information using text structure

🎯 How to identify an author's purpose

🔎 How text features help us better understand what we read

I am excited to see our students grow not only as readers, but also as thinkers who can make connections between what they read and their own experiences.

Wonders Unit 1 Week 1

Thank you for partnering with me as we begin this exciting school year. We are off to a great start, and I can't wait to see what this amazing group of third graders accomplishes together!

📝 Grammar Focus 

This week we will be focusing on the difference between sentences and sentence fragments. We will be talking about what makes up a sentence and that it’s important to have a subject and predicate to complete the sentence.

✍️  Writing Focus 

Our writing this week will tie in with our grammar concepts this week. Students will be answering writing prompts and making sure they are including complete sentences that tie in with a subject and predicate. We are also focusing on capital letters, finger spacing, and punctuation.

🔬Science Spotlight

This week in Science, we are starting a unit about weather patterns! We’ll be learning about some weird weather and where clouds come from.

✖️Math Corner:

This week we will review material learned in second grade. We will go over number sense and read and write numbers to 1000. We will compare two three-digit numbers using place value, using > <  = to record comparison.

🔠 Spelling Words- 

This week we will review words with short a and short i sounds. If your student got a 4 on the pretest that they took today, they will not need to take the posttest on Friday. If your student didn’t get a 4, please practice the spelling words all week long. They will take the posttest on Friday to show what they have learned.

clap

camp

hand

stamp

snack

rack

grabs

glad

bill

miss

click

pink

sick

grin

lift

cat

bit

man

anthill

cramp

ran

📚 Vocabulary Words

Admires means looks up to something or someone very highly.

A classmate is a person who is in the same class at school.

A community is a group of people who live in a certain area. They may share similar interests.

To contribute means to supply, give, or bring something about.

Practicing means doing something over and over to gain skill.

To pronounce means to speak or say the sound of a letter or word.

Scared means to be afraid of or frightened by something.

Tumbled means to have suddenly fallen in a helpless way or turned and rolled around.

📅 Important Dates

Student Code of Conduct and Technology Agreements due now

August 28th- Spirit Dress Day

Early Light Academy will be conducting hearing and speech screenings starting on August 31, 2026. Hearing screenings are required by the Utah State Board of Education each year for all third-grade students.

Thank you for partnering with us as we begin this exciting school year. We are off to a great start, and I can't wait to see what this amazing group of third graders accomplishes together!

Newsletter Friday, August 12, 2026

Welcome to Third Grade!

Dear Families,

Welcome to the 2026–2027 school year! I hope you had a wonderful summer and are ready for an exciting year of learning, growth, and adventure. My name is Kristen McIff, and I am thrilled to be your child’s third-grade teacher at Early Light Academy!

A Little About Me

Growing up with an educator as a mother, I developed a deep respect for the teaching profession at an early age. Her influence shaped my path and instilled in me a lifelong passion for learning—something I strive to inspire in my students every day. My goal is to empower students to become curious, confident, capable, and lifelong learners.

I believe great teachers are always learning, too. I am committed to continually growing in my practice through professional development, coursework, collaboration, and opportunities to learn from others. I am always looking for ways to strengthen my teaching and help my students reach their full potential.

Literacy holds a particularly special place in my heart. I have loved books for as long as I can remember! As a child, I eagerly participated in reading marathons and book challenges, and I am currently working my way through the 100 Must-Read American Novels. I hope to share that love of reading with your child and help them discover books that make them laugh, wonder, think, and see the world in new ways.

Outside of the classroom, I love spending time with my family. I am a proud parent of three children and a grandparent to two wonderful grandchildren. I am also a Disney enthusiast and enjoy gardening, hiking, and traveling. So far, I have explored 30 U.S. states and eight countries, and I am excited to see where my next adventure takes me!

Communication

I believe that strong communication between home and school is an important part of student success. Throughout the year, I will send a weekly newsletter with classroom updates, reminders, upcoming events, and important information.

You will also find our newsletters, a two-week look ahead, our year-long plan, homework, and important dates on our class website:

Mrs. McIff's 3rd Grade class important info

https://sites.google.com/earlylightacademy.org/mrs-mciffs-3rd-grade-class/important-info

Please bookmark this page! It will be updated regularly throughout the school year and will be an important resource for our classroom.

If you would like to meet with me during the school year, my office hours are Monday–Thursday from 3:30–4:00 p.m. The best way to reach me is by email, although you may also contact me through the school. I will do my best to respond within 48 hours.

Please also feel free to share anything you think would help me get to know your child— their interests, strengths, goals, or anything else that will help me support them and make this a successful year.

Important Dates

Back-to-School Night

Monday, August 17 | 5:00–7:00 p.m.

Back-to-School Night is a wonderful opportunity to drop off school supplies, meet me, ask questions, and learn more about our classroom expectations and school policies. I look forward to meeting you!

First Day of School

Tuesday, August 18

Please have your child dressed according to the school dress code and ready for an 8:20 a.m. start. Students should bring their lunch, backpack, school supplies, and a water bottle.

School dismisses at 3:10 p.m. If your child will be meeting a sibling after school, please make arrangements for a designated meeting spot outside the school.

Room Parent Volunteers

We’re looking for Room Parent volunteers for the 2026–2027 school year!

Being a Room Parent is a great way to get involved in your child’s classroom and help support our teachers throughout the year. Room Parents typically help celebrate teacher birthdays, plan and run up to four class parties, coordinate volunteers, decorate classroom doors for school-wide events, and help with Teacher Appreciation activities.

You can serve individually or as part of a Room Parent team, and you’re always welcome to recruit other classroom parents to help with parties, activities, and other needs throughout the year.

If you’re interested in volunteering, please fill out the Room Parent Interest Form here: https://forms.gle/a51Vuz7wvQGHskNs7

Questions about the role or time commitment? Please reach out to Mallory Bohn at roomparentcoordinator@earlylightacademy.org. She is happy to answer any questions!

Thank you for helping support our teachers, students, and ELA community!

Classroom Expectations

During the first week of school, we will spend time getting to know one another, learning classroom procedures, and establishing expectations for our learning community. We will also work together to create class rules that help everyone feel respected, included, safe, and ready to learn.

One important reminder is that toys should stay at home. We want our classroom to be a place where students can focus on learning, building friendships, and taking care of themselves and one another. We will also talk about respecting each other’s belongings and creating a classroom community where everyone feels welcome.

Let’s Make It a Great Year!

I am so excited to begin this journey with your child! Third grade is such an important and exciting year, and I am looking forward to watching your child grow academically, socially, and personally.

I truly believe that the best school years happen when teachers and families work together, and I am excited to partner with you throughout the year. Please never hesitate to reach out with questions, concerns, celebrations, or information that will help me better support your child.

Thank you for trusting me to be part of your child’s educational journey. I can't wait to see all that we will learn, discover, and accomplish together!

I look forward to seeing you at Back-to-School Night on August 17th!

Warmly,

Kristen McIff

Third Grade Teacher

Early Light Academy

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