Boys and achievement Flashcards
Feminisation of education
Sewell:
-Argued boys are falling behind in education due to the feminisation of it
-Schools don’t nurture ‘masculine’ traits such as competitiveness + leadership, instead they encourage qualities associated with girls
-Coursework= major cause of gender differences in achievement, should be replaced with final exams
Globalisation + decline of traditional male jobs
-Since the 1980’s there has been a significant decline in industries such as iron + steel, due to globalisation, they’ve moved to countries such as china to take advantage of their cheap labour
Mitsos + Browne:
-Had led to an identity crisis for men, as boys believe they have little prospect of getting a job, undermining their self-esteem + give up trying to get qualifications
Shortage of male primary school teachers
-Lack of male role models in both the home + school.
-Only 14% of primary school teachers are men
-YouGov (2007) surveyed that boys behave better + work harder in the presence of a male teacher
EVAL of male teachers
Read (2008):
-Disciplinary discourse- teachers authority is made explicit e.g. shouting
-Liberal discourse- teachers authority is implicit + invisible e.g. teacher speaks to the child as if they were an adult, expecting respect
-Found that most teachers, female + male use disciplinary discourse to control pupils behaviour, disproves the claim that education has become feminised
Laddish subcultures
-Growth of laddish subcultures has contributed to boys underachievement.
Epstein (1998):
-Found w/c boys are more likely to be harassed and labelled as sissies
-Supports Francis’ findings that boys are more worried about labels than girls as it’s seen as a threat to their masculinity
-Boys reject schoolwork as it’s viewed as being ‘gay’
Moral panic about boys
Ringrose (2013):
-Growing fear that w/c boys will grow up and become a dangerous, unemployable underclass that threatens social stability
-Shifted policy to focus on raising boys educational achievement: by narrowing policies to ‘failing boys’ it ignores disadvantaged ethnic minorities
