Wondering What To Do About Greater Depth?
- Aidan Severs
- Jun 9
- 3 min read
Updated: Oct 7
Your curriculum is great. You meet the needs of your pupils with SEND. But you know you could be doing more for those working at Greater Depth (although don't forget, pupils with SEND can be working at Greater Depth, too).
You're just not sure what. If you had the time and space to reflect, read and think about it you know you'd get there. But time is of the essence. Those pupils deserve the best possible teaching now, not in a year's time.
Sound familiar? Is that you?
The good news is that I've had that time, and I've worked with schools to develop this and there are ways to get going pretty quickly.
We could work together to create a strategy suited to you, your school, your pupils and your teachers. And then you could let me deliver it to staff.
You could even get this in place in readiness for September.If you know it's you in talking about, there's nothing more difficult to do than to get in touch with me and we can get things done.
In a follow-up call with a deputy head with whom I've worked on setting up a Greater Depth identification and assessment system, I got this great feedback:
"Last night we had a meeting between subject leaders and teachers so that teachers could provide subject leaders with assessment information about pupils working at greater depth. It was the first time we had done this since introducing the use of the Greater Depth characteristics to aid teacher assessment.
The conversations were better than they've ever been. Teachers were able to be more specific about why they had assessed pupils as working at greater depth. They had also been able to set targets using the resource. Teachers mentioned that their familiarity with the Greater Depth characteristics had allowed them to look for these characteristics as they taught, and that they were informing their planning, too.
I also noticed that teachers were no longer making judgements based on pupils' ability to write. Prior to the use of the Greater Depth characteristics, teachers had been identifying greater depth historians by their ability to write in their book or on their knowledge organiser. This led to further conversations about pupils who might previously have been missed, with one teacher saying, 'Before, you wouldn't have judged this child as Greater Depth based on their book...'. Because of this, this meeting was the first time where our approach to assessment in foundation subjects worked well for teachers and pupils in the early years.
There was a general sense that this approach is not extra work, just a different way of thinking."
To find out more about the work I did with the above school, check out these blog posts:
There are still spaces in my diary during the summer term if you'd like to get ready for the approaching academic year - get in touch now to grab your time with me.
I also have availability in 2025-2026, including some potential for September training days if you're quick!
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