A Message From Our School
The Blessed Virgin Mary is our mother because of Jesus. She accepted God’s invitation to be the Mother of the Messiah. She gave birth to Jesus and raised Him with St. Joseph. Mary is the Mother of Jesus, and because of this, she is also the Mother of the Catholic Church and Mother of all the faithful. She sets a great example for us of unwavering faith and trust in God. Mary comes to our aid to help us; she is a mother who wants to see all of us love God and listen to her Son. She helps us to do this in any way she can. Mary is a Mediatrix of graces, meaning that she dispenses graces to us that God gives to her for this purpose. Mary is the person closest to God. No other human was as close to Jesus as she was, as she is. May Mary continue to inspire us all, especially us Mothers to be the best versions of ourselves and to shower our children with the love that she so beautifully emparted on Jesus and on all of us.
A Prayer for Mothers
Good and Gentle God,
We pray in gratitude for our mothers and for all the women of theory who have joined with you in the wonder of bringing forth new life. You who became human through a woman, grant to all mothers the courage they need to face the uncertain future that life with children always brings.
Give them the strength to live and to be loved in return, not perfectly, but humanly.
Give them the faithful support of husband, family and friends as they care for the physical and spiritual growth of their children.
Give them joy and delight in their children to sustain them through the trials of motherhood. Most of all, give them the wisdom to turn to you for help when they need it most.
Dear Mary Queen of Heaven families,
Welcome back to term 2, we are now three weeks in and have already experienced so many learning opportunities as a community. Our year 1/2s recently visited Explorers Early Learning as an excursion to inspire their term 2 learning about ways we can care for our environment through the lens of composting. We have a whole school excursion booked for Thursday 18th May at Woodlands Historic Park in Greenvale. We will travel together and immerse ourselves in the beauty of the space, the indigenous heritage and learn about ways we can care for this magnificent land gifted to us.
Yesterday we had a school closure day to further develop our learning and understanding around Inquiry. We have partnered with Traces for Learning Consultants. Traces ‘dream of a school for children’s voices, for educators to feel joy, for families to feel welcome and honored. Our dream is realised through dialogue, trust, challenge, and innovation.’ This heart connection to learning, to curiosity, to play and to inquiry is what Mary Queen of Heaven is all about. We have been re-inspired by our learning with Traces.
Our school yard is developing with the village green open for the children to access at breaks and during lessons and learning time. The children are taking full advantage of this beautiful space, it’s beautiful to see. We have more yard developments to come this term with line markings of snakes and ladders and hopscotch as well as additional line marking to create a basketball court over the netball court. We have basketball backboards being installed and if the rain continues, we hope to have one of the grassed areas open by mid or end of term 2 (the builders are guiding us around this).
We are excited to announce that we are about to launch the Dogs Connect program in our school. This is a whole school wellbeing program which will see the introduction of Mac & Bluebell, two wellbeing dogs into our community. Our school well being dogs will become much loved and important members of our community.
The Dogs Connect program will support us in implementing this very gradually, thoroughly, and considerately. At this stage we encourage anyone who would like to know more about this program to look through the website link below: https://dogsconnect.net.au
We are very excited to be introducing our wellbeing dogs in term 3. We have a team of staff who will lead this program. We look forward to sending more information in the coming days.
We would also like to assure the community that this program will not involve anyone who does not wish to be involved.
We know that this work will have a really positive impact on many people in our community, and we acknowledge and respect that connection with our wellbeing dog will be offered on a great variety of levels.
Mac & Bluebell are 6 month old Groodles. Mac is a large, blonde boy who is curious, clumsy and gentle. He loves affection and being around others. Bluebell is a petite redhead. She is obedient and loves to follow rules. She loves being petted and has oodles of energy.
As we prepare the students for Mac & Bluebells arrival, we will be covering the following topics, you might like to support these messages at home:
- Practice zipping up lunch boxes and bags to reduce temptation
- Practice greeting the owner not the dog- look at the owner and say hello and walk straight past the dog (this reduces excitement and helps the dog feel safe and secure)
- Practice talking to the dogs in a normal voice, no baby talk to high pitched voices as this can be too over stimulating
Mac & Bluebell cannot wait to meet the students and parents of Mary Queen of Heaven.
Please note our news school phone number is (03) 7379 5600. Please save this to your mobile phones
Swimming
https://learn2swimweek.com/about/
This week we are sending home a survey to establish how many of our families engage in swimming lessons for their children. Learning to swim is a gift that you can offer your children. It can be life saving. We strongly recommend that all families engage in swimming lessons with their children until they can swim strongly enough to save themselves if they were ever to get into trouble in the water.
Learning & Teaching
Inquiry learning
Spotlight on 1-2
Last week, the children in 1-2 visited Explorers Early Learning Centre in Greenvale as part of our Inquiry, ‘Our world needs us’. They engaged all senses as they immersed in this experience. They were engaged in learning about how we can utilise food scraps to create a worm farm. Children wondered about how the worms break down the food scraps. They even had a chance to hold a wiggly worm! “It feels slimy!” one child remarked. They learned that worms are treated to a ‘worm smoothie’ where the food scraps are blended together to make a liquid, which makes it much easier for them to process! One child was curious about how it smelt, “It smells yum” she exclaimed afterwards!
Children will use this learning experience as they inquire into how we can care for our world, starting with our school.
Do you have a worm farm or compost bin at home? Would you like to share your experience with setting this up with our 1-2 children? Please contact Leanne if you would be interested in sharing your knowledge with our children! lcribbin@mqhgreenvale.catholic.edu.au (WWCC required).
Expression of Interest
Private Music Tutoring
If you are interested in private music lessons (instrumental lessons) for your child/ren please contact the school office 73795600. If we gather enough interest, instrumental lessons will be offered in term 3.
Reminders:
- If your child is absent for any reason or is going to be late to school, it is a legal obligation that you let us know immediately. This is to ensure all parties know the whereabouts of the child to ensure they are safe. Please use the Skoolbag App to log absence or a planned late arrival. If you require support with this, please come and see us in the office.
- If you hold a current Working With Childrens Check, please email info@mqhgreenvale.catholic.edu.au ASAP so that you can be added to our volunteers register. Please include in the email your full name, date of birth and your WWCC Number. When you come into school to help, we will take a photocopy of your WWCC card to keep on file. If you would like to Volunteer or help within the school in any capacity (including Parent helpers on excursions) you must attend a Parent Volunteer Information Session and hold a Current Working With Children Check, these records will be kept on file at the schools and updated each year.
Family Health Care Card Holders
If you currently hold a Family Health Care Card, please contact the office in person or via email tmattei@mqhgreenvale.catholic.edu.au and we will update your details.
Asthma & Allergies
If your child/children has asthma or any allergies, please notify the office and provide an updated action plan from your doctor as soon as possible.
Icy Poles
Back by popular demand, we will be selling at 2pm each Monday and Friday. We need parent volunteers to help this success, please let us know if you can volunteer.
