How common is it to be at Greater Depth throughout primary school?

[drinkingbeer]

Friend has 3 kids in Y7, 6 and 3. She says they've all been getting Greater Depth in all subjects throughout their primary years. How common is this? My daughter in Y3 is bright and got a Greater depth in one area but expected on others. I know it's totally not appropriate to compare kids, but what's the reality like? Has anyone's kids got GD across the board for every single report?

@Itstarts My negativity isn't towards the teacher. It's towards the concept of assessing small children against criteria that focus solely on their abilities to write and calculate and the lifelong self esteem issues this can cause for some people.

Mine are but they also are autistic and there isn't tick box for well below age related expectations for social skills and emotional maturity ! All kids are different. Academic ability is only of so much use if you can't function in the real world... I find it so frustrating that so much weight is put on academic achievement in young kids when there is SO much more to them and their amazing developing personalities.

@dootball @CarpingOnwards that’s incorrect. 10-15 percent a year are greater depth in English, math and writing not each subject individually. The percentage getting greater depth for each individual subject is higher but getting it across all three key subjects is 10-15 percent.

This information is all published every year

Also, the assessment criteria aren’t random, they are assessing academic ability.

The children don’t need to know anything about the scores so I’m not sure where the self-esteem comes into it. It’s shared with the parents who typically want to know.

It's about 3-5% of the primary school cohort that score a 3 in all areas in EYFS, KS1 and KS2.
I have one that does, one child that definitely doesn't.
It's not implausible that your friend has 3 children that do, I know a very clever , switched on woman that also has very clever switched on children who score 3s throughout on the school report.

www.find-school-performance-data.service.gov.uk/school/145130/goose-green-primary-and-nursery-school/primary/results-by-pupil-characteristics?accordionstate=0

you can see the national data for children achieving the higher standard at KS2 in the first table. For all 3 of reading, writing and math it was 13 percent in 2019 (the last year published results for SATs)

Oh god never heard of this… Not another aspiration for the pushy moms and league table pot-hunting schools to pressure the poor kids with…

My ds was at GD every time in Primary. He now gets exceeding in high school.

Surely age related expectations are an average so you will have plenty outlines at either end of the scale? I've never heard the phrase though and work in a school. DC with involved parents are more likely to achieve this and it's easier to race ahead at primary, often levels out later

I would say it's unusual to be a GD in every single subject every single year for all the dc but not impossible of course.

Probably because people don’t usually talk about it. The only children whose results I know are my family or very close friends. It’s a bit like talking about money I think especially if you have a gifted child. It can easily be seen as bragging.

I think it’s also more common to have multiple children that achieve greater depth too than just one as it seems genetic?

GD is given at Y2/6 end of KS results. Between those year groups schools will have different assessments as there are no national ones. What one school says is GD won't necessarily match up with another school. Don't worry about What your friend is saying!

@MomFromSE thank you for clarifying that, very interesting, i didn't realise that. So actually greater depth in just one subject is even higher than that.

It does happen. Particularly if a child is identified as ‘gifted’ or higher learning potential. I do think it can change hugely as they move up through the curriculum though and subjects are studied in greater depth. I particularly dislike parents bragging about their children’s ‘giftedness’ and make a point of not discussing my own child’s performance with friends.

I was being factious with "random", sorry, but the boundaries are arbitrary.

The point i was (badly and crossly) making was that someone in an office somewhere gets to decide what is 'normal' and what is ' greater depth' for a given age of child, and that it is therefore not something to worry about (unless you are specifically worried about measuring a child against the criteria, which a teacher might be but a parent shouldn't/needn't be).

The comment about self esteem is because, as this thread evidences, parents do in fact compare children to each other and every time a comparison occurs someone comes out worse off.

In the school my children go to they are given the reports to see. This doesn't happen in the school i work in (yes, i am in fact a teacher, just one who doesn't read the national data sets 🤣), but it clearly does happen, so in those instances it can affect self esteem directly.

Apologies for taking out my anger at the system on @Itstarts.

Reasonably common. But your friend may still be lying!

It was called gifted and talented when mine were at primary. All of mine were counted as it. One did well but not outstanding at GCSE, one did outstanding and the other turned out to have fairly severe learning difficulties and only got 4 GCSEs and cannot do maths. So I wouldn’t read too much into it.

Just depends on the teacher/school. DD’s old school told me DD was gifted, and working 2 yrs ahead in every subject, but whenever report time came down they just put her as meeting expected level. The school budget was tight and they didn’t want a paper trail acknowledging that she was gifted, as then they’d have to explain to Ofsted why she’d not ben given any special tuition.

We left that school 👀 and went to one with a different approach

@CarpingOnwards yes, maths and English individually are about 20 percent of pupils individually give or take though greater depth for writing is less than this.

Schools have their own assessment measures and procedures since levels were abolished some years ago. Remember “assessment without levels” training? So all are somewhat varied and down to interpretation. Good schools will get other teachers to moderate though. You don’t want year 6 looking as if 30% are greater depth but sats produces 10%!

Not sure how anyone working in a school hasn’t heard of this. It’s pretty standard regarding assessment and certainly I’ve pored over stats when I was a governor. Greater depth was the green section on the printout!

Both mine always got it in all areas. Grammar school now.

I think 20 % per class?

The weirdest one for me is 'reading age' where every single child I knew was about 4 years younger than their alleged reading age.

Most people use the government progress stats and the explanation attached for greater depth. My local school does well enough as does the LA.

Do the criteria assess academic ability or academic achievement? They are not the same, particularly at that age. Parents who both value academics and are "very supportive" transform many children of moderate ability into "high" achievers.

DD1 was always GD in all areas at primary and is now at an academic secondary and doing well. She is very underconfident in all areas other than academic ability.

DD2 (Y3) has (so far) been GD in all areas but is not as academic as DD1.

DS has never achieved GD in any area (eventually got Expected in his Y6 SATS in all areas but that was a push).

I think it is more common than people think.

@user149799568 academic ability is the same as achievement though different from academic ‘potential’ which is not what is being assessed. Potential of course is different though highly correlated with crystallised ability typically.