24 May 2024
FROM THE PRINCIPAL
There are so many beautiful depictions of Mary, the mother of God, and I just love this one by artist, Sharon Clyburn.
How blessed we are to have Mary as the patroness of our school and parish.
Mary, Help of Christians… teach us wisdom, teach us love.
The children have had a fabulous feast day, enjoying good food and good fun whilst similtaneously raising $1000 for St Mary’s school in Cambodia. I know you’ll enjoy the gallery of photos further down in the newsletter.
Happy Feast Day to us!
Warm regards,
Liz
Liz Watts
Principal
UPCOMING EVENTS
Term 2
- Sunday 26th May - Parish Feast Day Picnic
- Monday 27th May - Monday 3rd June- National Reconciliation Week
- Wednesday 29th May - GRIP Leadership for selected Year 6 students
- Thursday 30th May - Staff Development Day (pupil-free day)
- Monday 10th June - Public Holiday - King's Birthday
- Friday 14th June - Year 3-6 Choir Performance at The Link
- Thursday 20th June - Wildfire band visit K-6
- Monday 24th June - MHOC inaugural Rubik's Cube tournament
- Friday 28th June - K-2 Choir Performance at The Link
- Monday 1st July - NAIDOC Week commences
- Friday 5th July - Term awards
- Friday 5th July - Semester 1 Reports go home
- Friday 5th July - Last day Term 2
Term 3
- Monday 22nd July - Staff Development Day (pupil-free day)
- Tuesday 23rd July - Term 3 commences for students
- Friday 26th July - Grandparents’ Day - save the date!
WHAT'S THE BUZZ?
Grandparents’ Day - Save the Date
Our annual Grandparents Day will be held this year on Friday 26th July.
LOVING LEARNING
Year 3 Persuasive Text
Year 3 have loved reading ‘Wandi’, a true story of one of Australia’s endangered alpine dingoes. They have thoroughly enjoyed responding to the text in different ways, with many students inspired to protect our native species by this informative, persuasive text.
Margaret Ryan
Assistant Principal
Learning & Teaching
FROM THE MISSION DESK
Loving God,
you place deep in our hearts the love of Mary, Help of Christians. Through her
prayers grant wisdom to all those who help and guide us and may we live in
harmony, justice and peace. We ask this in Jesus’ name.
Amen
MHOC Feast Day
May 24 is the Feast of Mary Help of Christians. This is an important Feast in our country because Mary, under the title “Help of Christians”, is a spiritual Patrones of Australia, along with St. Mary of the Cross MacKillop. It is a day of joy and celebration for our school!
This morning, students, staff and parents filled the hall with song and prayer at our special MHOC Feast Day liturgy. Afterwards, students participated in peer groups and our very first whole school digital art activity (Thanks Mrs Edwards). Have a look at some of the beautiful artworks below.
I think the children particularly enjoyed eating their ice blocks, cupcakes and sausage sandwiches and of course the colour run. What a fabulous day!
Peer Groups
In Peer Groups today, students had fun together creating and recording actions to the Mary Help of Christians Prayer. They also played a dice game called Roll-A-Prayer. Our year 6 leaders did a tremendous job running the sessions.
What’s Been Happening in Religious Education in Kindergarten?
With Mary Help of Christians Feast day this week, it was only fitting that Kindergarten spent the week learning about who Mary is to us. After a week of singing, reading and exploring artworks about Mary Help of Christians, this is what we have come up with:
- “Mary is the Mother of Jesus”
- “Mary is the Mother of God”
- “Mary loves me”
- “Mary is a friend to us”
- And the teachers’ personal favourite…… “I think I saw Mary at a cafe.”
Check out our lovely pictures of Mary.
Term 2 Class Masses
All parents are welcome to attend our weekly Tuesday Mass at 9:30am. These class Masses are held at MHOC Church Sawtell. Please see the timetable below for Term One.
Tuesday 28th May - Kinder and Year 6
Tuesday 4th June - Year 2
Tuesday 11th June - Year 1
Tuesday 18th June - Year 5
Tuesday 25th June - Year 4
Parish Feast Day Picnic
You are welcome to come and continue Feast Day celebrations at the parish this Sunday at 9am. Afterwards there will be a picnic to be held in the church grounds as well as a sausage sizzle, face painting, a jumping castle and a coffee van. All welcome!
Amber Biddle
Assistant Principal
Mission
Toni Fletcher
Leader of
Catechesis
SENSEI'S CORNER
Tallan and Lauren are regulars - these pics show them riding close to the middle.
Boyd Sensei
MHOC SCHOOL COMMUNITY FORUM
MHOC Reading Night
Join us for a family reading adventure including a pizza dinner from Rej's Old Skool Pizza.
Click here to register.
Bunnings Cake Stall Save the Date
Speaking of fundraising… Sunday 23rd June has been locked in for our next Bunnings Cake stall. We raised close to $1K at the last one so thank you to all of the bakers and sellers. If you are able to help out, please complete this form.
Safe on Social Parent Workshop - St Augustine's Primary School
Bingo
The rostered teams for the next few weeks' Bingo are:
- Thursday 30th May - team no. 2 (Kelly's team)
- Thursday 6th June - team no. 3 (Catherine's team)
- Thursday 13th June - team no. 4 (Donna's team)
Jo Melinz
PSF President
SPORT NEWS
What a week in sport! 14 MHOC long-distance runners travelled to Grafton on Tuesday to compete at the Diocesan Cross Country event in touch muddy conditions, then had to back up the very next day at the MHOC Athletics Carnival.
Well done to Lacey van Hoeck (1st place!) and Laila Summers, who will now travel to Sydney to represent Lismore Diocese at the Polding Cross Country carnival in a couple of weeks. Good luck girls!
Speaking of the Athletics Carnival … thank you everyone for your prayers. The sun shone all day and we had a lot of fun!
- The teachers finally won the Parents v Teachers v Captains race
- Kinders raced in their first athletics carnival
- Records were broken
- Mrs Glover celebrated her birthday
The Champion House will be announced on Monday.
The records that were broken were:
- Layla Verbruggen
- 11 yr 100m 15.50 sec (previously 15.81 - Monique Hill, 2019)
- 11 yr Long Jump 3.63m (previously 3.26m - Mosa Strydom, 2023)
- Gabrielle Laurie - 13yr 100m 15.28 sec (previously 15.84 - Chantel Montiel, 2015)
- Luke Doust - Jnr 1500m 6.23 min (previously 6.31 - Lachlan Herbert, 2023)
- Lacey van Hoeck - 11 yr 1500m 6.18 min (previously 6.44 - Eva Corsalini, 2022)
- Ruby Culverwell - Snr 1500m 6.34 min (previously 6.36 - Eva Corsalini, 2023)
A full list of Athletics records can be found here.
Due to our Feast Day liturgy taking place today, the age champions will be announced at next week’s assembly, and names published in next week’s newsletter.
The 2 highest-placed athletes in each event will progress to the Clarence Zone carnival in Coffs Harbour on 30th July, and we will notify these students early next week.
Thank you to our volunteer parents who helped at the finish line, the shot put field, the long jump pit and to all our parents who came to watch. We hope you all took some precious memories away from the day.
AFL
Good luck to our teams heading to the Paul Kelly Cup on Monday. Monday’s re-scheduled event should go ahead no matter than weather (unless extreme), as the synthetic fields have been booked as a back-up.
Rugby Union
This week was Year Six’s turn for a come and try rugby union session. Members of the Marlin’s rugby club gave up their time to run skills, drills and games with Year Six students who wanted to try the sport. The feedback from the students was very positive and we had an equal number of girls and boys in the sessions. The coaches reported that the children were excellent listeners and awesome sportspeople (which we already knew). If your child attended these sessions and is interested in signing up to rugby union, see the flyer below.
Rebecca Bennett
Leader of PDHPE
Geraldine Hourigan
Sports Administrator
CANTEEN NEWS
Canteen Red Day
Order now on Flexischools!
Canteen Appreciation Week
For Canteen Appreciation Week, we would love to thank all of our volunteers that come in to help us out. The support you provide helps us in creating a healthy canteen for our students. Our students love seeing your smiling faces each and every day.
Canteen Roster
Monday 27 May
Kath Rallings
Tuesday 28th May
Cheryl Jones
Wednesday 29th May
Thursday 30th May
STAFF DEVELOPMENT DAY
Friday 31st May
Liz Jackson
Parent and grandparent volunteers are always needed and welcome. Please phone the school or complete this form if you can spare some time in the canteen.
Helpers are needed each day this coming week. Please email sawp-canteen@lism.catholic.edu.au or phone the office if you can help.
Meba Winter
Lisa Mangan
OSHC
Week 4 has been a blast for the OSHC students and educators. The children have been enjoying all of our programmed activities which have been centered around their requests and interests. Some favorites have been white board games, beading, Just Dance, and a variety of sports on the field. The new equipment is still a go-to for many of our students aswell. They have also been loving the variety and change in our afternoon tea menu which includes a range of fresh seasonal fruit, crackers and dip, wraps, flavored rice cakes, just to name a few. We continue to encourage our community for any feedback or suggestions for our service.
Jemma C
Laura McDiarmid
MHOC OSHC Coordinator
NEWS FROM OUR PARISH
Parish Survey
This weekend there will be copies handed out at the church for parishioners to take and complete. The survey is an initiative of the PPC to obtain some information and feedback from parishioners. Please take some time to complete this and place in the buckets provided or the communication box until 10th June. Alternatively it can be dropped int othe parish office or given to a member of the PPC.
A digital copy is also available here for those who prefer this format.
This week we had a smaller group who still had some energy after the athletics carnival. We had a focus on Mary for our feast day this week and played skittles to earn words in a race to put together the Hail Mary prayer. Violet was the power bowler but there was no problem with anyone remembering the prayer to put it together.
Mary Help of Christians Parish Feast Day Mass & Picnic Celebration
We are looking forward to seeing many families here this Sunday for our school- led Mass and the following celebration with games, face painting, sausage sizzle and more.
Sacraments for Children
Preparation for Confirmation will begin for children in Group 24 with parent sessions. Wednesday 5th June at 6pm OR Saturday 8th June at 9am in the Parish meeting room.
Baptism
The Sacrament of Baptism is available to those requesting it. Please ring Jennifer at the Parish Office (66583544) or talk to Amber Biddle, Liz Watts or Margaret Ryan at school if you have any questions. Alternatively, if you wish to register for Baptism, there is now the option of an online request form .
Parish Website , E-bulletin & Facebook Page
For all the latest news from our parish, check out the Parish website or subscribe to our new e-bulletin which can be sent directly to your inbox each week. Why not sign up today by entering your details in the sign up box on the Homepage or Contact page of the website!
And don’t forget to check out our FaceBook page
Carolyn Tumminello
Pastoral Associate
COMMUNITY NEWS
