class differences in achievement INTERNAL Flashcards
Topics - INTERNAL
- Labelling
- Self fulfilling prophecy
- Streaming
- Pupil subculture
- Pupil identity - MC habitus, symbolic capital / violence, WC identity, nike identity
- Labelling
attaching meaning or definition to pupils - teachers may label students as ‘bright’ or ‘troublemaker’. There is evidence to suggest that teachers pass judgement on their students based on pre existing stereotypes of what constitutes the ‘ideal pupil’ - this is often linked to the class background of their students. Sociologists are interested in how students and teachers react to those labels and the impact they have an educational achievement
Labelling in secondary schools
Becker - using interviews of 60 high school teachers, Becker found that teachers stereotyped students based on their appearance, work and conduct. Teachers saw MC children as the closest to their stereotype of the ‘ideal pupil’ and WC children as the furthest away from ‘ideal’
Dunne and Gazeley - argue that ‘schools persistently produce WC underachievement’ because of the labels and assumptions of teachers
Rist - labelling in primary school
Labelling began on the 8th day when children were permanently seated at 3 separate tables - found that teachers used information about their pupils home backgrounds to place pupils in separate groups. Each group was asked to sit at different tables. The teachers labelling ‘the fast learners’ as ‘Tigers’ and seated them closer to her and showed them more encouragement - these children tend to come from MC backgrounds. The other 2 groups were names ‘Cordinals’ and ‘Clowns’. They were seated further away from the teacher, given lower reading books and less attention - generally WC pupils
KEDDIE (1971) - unequal access to classroom knowledge
Low ability groups WC - descriptive, common sense, basic, dumbed down
Top ability groups MC - abstract, theoretical, detailed, full curriculum
- Self Fulfilling Prophecy - SFP
This is prediction that comes purely on the basis of it being made. Labelling can affect pupils’ achievement by creating SFP
Stage 1 - teacher labels pupil and makes predictions about them in relation to the label
Stage 2 - the teacher interacts with the pupil based on this label and prediction
Stage 3 - pupil internalises label, prediction and teachers’ expectations and it becomes part of their self concept. The pupil becomes the label and acts accordingly to the prediction and this ‘fulfils’ the original ‘prophecy’
- Streaming
Educational triage
Pupils > triage > those who will pass anyway > borderline C/D pupils > hopeless cases
- Pupil subcultures - LACEY
DIFFERENTIATION - refers to the way that teachers categorise or ‘differentiate’ between pupils according to stereotypes about ability, appearance etc. Setting and streaming are forms of differentiation as well as ‘foundation’ and ‘higher’ tier exam differentiation
POLARISATION - the process in which pupils respond to streaming by moving towards one of two opposites ‘poles’ or extremes. Lacey found that streaming polarised boys into ‘pro’ and ‘anti’ school subcultures
WC pupils found the value system of the school contradictory in terms of their own progress, options, status and progression. This creates frustration and results in WC pupils forming ‘resistant’. Anti school subcultures that directly oppose the values that the education system promotes (Willis 1977)
Variety of pupil responses - WOODS
- Integration - being ‘teachers pet’
- Ritualism - going through motions and staying out of trouble
- Retreatism - day dreaming and messing around
- Rebellion - outright rejection of everything the school stands for
Rosenthal and Jacobson (1968)
- Teacher’s expectations and the self fulfilling prophecy
- Pygmalion effect
- R + J told the school 20% of the students were academic ‘spurters’ (untrue)
- They wanted to see how the teachers interactions with the ‘spurters’ would impact the students academic ability
- The students who the teachers believed to be ‘spurters’ made significant progress
Polarisation leads to 2 subcultural responses…
Pro school subculture - associated with MC, positive stereotypes, positive labels, ‘halos’, high sets and streams, high status knowledge and more attention, high expectations, positive SFP
Anti school subculture - associated with MC, negative stereotypes, negative labels, no ‘halo’, low sets and streams, low status knowledge and less attention, low expectations, negative SFP
Interactionist theories
Shows how the education system is not a neutral institution. These approaches can also be used to criticise Functionalist Theory of the role of education. Other criticisms may be that subcultural theories ignore other types of responses by pupils. Furlong argues that pupils can go through many different responses. They ignore cultural / material deprivation theories and gender and ethnicity factors. Marxists say they ignore wider ‘structural’ problems. They assume all teachers stereotype and label pupils. They assume once a label is attached that it ‘sticks’ and that then dictates pupils educational careers. Labelling theory tends to blame teachers for labelling pupils but family’s to explain why they do so. Teachers are in a system that reproduces class division
- Pupil identity
Habitus - refers to the learned or taken for granted ways of thinking, being and acting that are shared by a particular social class - includes tastes and preferences about lifestyle and consumption, their outlook on life and their expectations about what is normal for ‘people like us’ - MC have the power to define its habitus as superior and impose it on the education system (BOURDIEU culture capital)
Symbolic capital and violence
MC have been socialised at home with MC tastes and preferences whereas WC tastes are deemed to be worthless and tasteless - Bourdieu says attitude shown by the school towards WC lifestyles amounts to ‘symbolic violence’, by defining WC tastes and lifestyle as inferior, symbolic violence reproduces the class structure and keeps WC in their place - WC feel unable to access MC spaces (eg uni, careers)
Nike identity
Pupils become are that society and school look down on them. Schools negative attitudes or symbolic violence led pupils to seek alternative ways of gaining status, self worth and value. They did this by investing heavily in styles especially consuming branded clothing such as nike and adidas - girls adopted a type of hyper heterosexual feminine style - ‘Nike’ style plays a part in WC pupils’ rejection of higher education
