About Us
‘Where every child matters, and every moment counts’
We are part of the Rivermead Inclusive Trust where our focus is on inclusion and recognising the uniqueness of our learners. We are an 80 place resourced provision who offer an aspirational and individualised learning environment for children with a diagnosis of autism. .
We pride ourselves on our values of Confidence, Belonging, Respect and Courage. There is nothing we love more than celebrating the personal achievements for our children or seeing their smiles at their enjoyment of learning opportunities. All of our pupils have a diagnosis of autism as well as an Education, Health and Care Plan and we pride ourselves on being specialists in meeting our pupils needs.
Our aim here at the Marlborough is to provide an environment which not only aims to look holistically at our pupils and provide bespoke curriculum plans, which we do, but also to have a keen focus on learning and achievement to have high aspirations for our pupils to help them fulfill their potential. We believe that every child is capable of amazing things and that our role is to make every moment matter in a way that is suited to the child and their needs.
The Marlborough has definitely changed over the years. Whereas the main focus historically was on additional support with an aim of pupils spending most of their time in mainstream learning or transitioning to this, over the years we have changed to meet the increasing need of Medway children and now provide full time specialist education for pupils with autism within our setting alone.
I am incredibly passionate about the work we do here at the Marlborough. I am thankful every day that my teaching journey led me to special education because I truly believe that the children I have had the privilege to work with over the years have taught me just as much as I have taught them! I am dedicated to providing a school where our children have access to the very latest evidence based learning to meet a wide range of needs. I firmly believe in building solid foundations of communication, resilience and life skills on which to layer the academic learning. We see every child as capable and unique in their own right and progress is tracked individually in a way that celebrates their achievement. Everything we do here is focused around our knowledge and experience of autism, it’s what we do best!
Here at the Marlborough, we love the fact we are a small setting. It means that I can walk through each class and know every childs name and be involved in conversations around their progress and get to know them and their families. Staff help and support each other and that creates easier transitions year on year for our children as they are familiar with our staff day to day. We have developed resources within our school such as a soft play room, active playground and sensory room as much as we can but this also allows us the opportunity to go out in to the community to access other enrichment activities such as Forest School, swimming and horseriding.
We pride ourselves on our ability and expertise to identify the priority learning areas for children in a holistic way to create a curriculum pathway based on the unique needs of the individual. Our ethos is strongly rooted in the belief that every child is capable of amazing things and we strive to nurture this through providing an environment that is kind, compassionate and adaptable.
Our focus for learning is ensuring that each child fulfils their own potential. We offer a broad and balanced curriculum with a phonics programme written specifically with autism strengths in mind. We are able to provide the skills and expertise in differentiating the National Curriculum in a way suited to our pupils to focus on having high expectations for learning progress wherever we can. Some of our pupils access multiple learning curricula where relevant for them and changes whenever the childs needs change. I am so proud of our teachers who plan such bespoke and targeted learning for each and every child.
Our Values form the foundations for all we do. Our aim is to ensure our children leave us with the courage to make safe choices even when that feels like the hardest thing to do, the confidence to try something new and cope with the unexpected, the ability to respect others, themselves and the world in which they live and finally the understanding that they belong to a wider community to which they contribute and matter.
Mrs L Kennett
Head of Provision