Our annual parish picnic at Edmund Rice College was a wonderful community event and I thank our St Pius X families who supported this fun day. As a school we have strong links to the parish of Immaculate Conception and we are so grateful of the work of Father Duane and Sr Kerry in supporting the parish/school partnership. 

Staff, alongside Father Duane will attend a spiritual retreat at Mount Keira on Monday. This retreat will focus on prayer and encounter. As a school, we have had a focus on prayer and the children have responded well to daily Christian meditation experiences in the classroom. Staff look forward to bringing new prayer experiences explored on this day back into the classrooms, including “Lectio Divina", a Latin term, meaning "divine reading". This describes a way of reading the Scriptures whereby we gradually let go of our own agenda and open ourselves to what God wants to say to us.

Thank you to all those that were able to join us at last nights Parents and Friends Meeting. Mr Whittle unpacked out National Assessment Program Literacy and Numeracy (NAPLAN) results at this meeting. NAPLAN is a series of tests focussed on basic skills that are administered to students in years 3 and 5.  

Some highlights from Mr Whittle’s presentation included:

• In the five domains of Reading, Writing , Spelling, Grammar/Punctuation and Numeracy St Pius X is above the State, Nation, Diocese and statically similar schools, excluding Year Five reading which is on par.

• A continual and strategic focus on growth and quality learning and teaching across Kindergarten to Year Six. This includes clear target setting for every child, ensuring continuous improvement for our students. 

Finally, can I kindly ask that all parents encourage their child(ren) to submit their entry in the book of the year competition. Entries are due on August 15th, with winners announced at the Book Week Parade. Children may write in any genre and present their book digitally or as a hard copy. We encourage the original work of the child.