Differential Achievement- Boys Flashcards
Name the external factors
Boys poor literacy skills
Decline in traditional male jobs
Unrealistic expectations
Name the internal factors
Feminisation of education
Teacher interactions
Laddish subcultures
Ao1 boys poor literacy skills
According to the DCSF, the gender gap is mainly the result of boys poor literacy and language skills
Evidence suggest that girls are more likely to spend their leisure time in ways which benefit their education and contribute to their educational achievements
Mitsos and Browne emphasise reading and women are more likely to read than men and mothers are more likely than fathers to read to their children
Girls are more likely to have the positive same sex role models to encourage them to read
Ao3 boys poor literacy skills
Schemes have been introduced by the government to tackle this problem, such as the fathers and sons reading campaign which suggests there is an important reason for boys under achievement
Ao1 the decline in traditional male jobs
Since the 1980s, there has been a significant decline in the heavy industry, such as iron and steel mining and engineering
The decline in male manual jobs may result in working class boys lacking motivation
Mitsos and Browne argue at this decline and in male employment Opportunities has led to the crisis of masculinity.
Many boys now believe that they have a little chance of gaining a proper job. This undermines their self-esteem and motivation so they give up trying at school.
Ao3 decline of traditional male jobs
While there should be some truth in these claims, it is noted that the decline has largely been traditional manual working class jobs many of them skilled or semi skilled
Traditionally, many of these jobs would have been failed with working class boys with not much qualifications therefore, it seems unlikely that the disappearance of such jobs would have much of an impact on boys motivation to gain qualifications
Ao1 unrealistic expectations
Research indicates that boys are often surprised when they fail the exams and tend to put their failure down to bad luck, rather than the lack of effort
Becky Francis points out that boys are more likely to have career aspirations that are not only unrealistic, but often require a few formal qualifications for example, professional footballer
Girls aspirations tend to require academic effort, for example doctor and therefore they commit to schoolwork
Ao3
Unrealistic aspirations
Girls also have unrealistic aspirations today, for example, models or influences
Ao1
Feminisation of education
According to Sewell boys baseball behind behind in education, because schools have become feminised
This means that schools tend to emphasise feminine traits such as methodical and attentiveness which disadvantages boys
Sewell states that coursework leads to the gender differences education, he argues that some coursework should be replaced with final exams and that an emphasis should be put on outdoor adventure in the curriculum
Ao3 feminisation of education
Action has been taken to tackle this problem. For example, there has been a shift towards controlled assessment in place of coursework this is to reduce the advantages that girls have in classwork based subjects
Ao1 negative teacher interactions
Negative labelling for some ball has undermined their confidence and interest in schools
For both boys and girls where motivation in a subject is low, achievement tends to be low
Teachers may tend to be less strict with boys, expecting a lower standard of work than they can get from girls
This can allow boys to underachieve by failing to push them to achieve their potential
Ao3 negative teacher interactions
Fullers study where the black girls did not conform to their labels Instead they pushed themselves to achieve higher than what was expected from them.
Ao1 laddish subcultures
Mac and Ghail examined the relationship between schooling, work, masculinity and sexuality
They identified that particular people form subcultures and the macho lads could explain why some boys underachieve in education.
This group was hostile like the lads in Willis Study . Willis argued that work, especially physical work was essential to the development of a sense of identity.
In the mid-1980s, much of this kind of work had gone and unemployment became the norm for many working class boys
Ao3 laddish subcultures
Willis used a small sample size, meaning it lacks representative, so this cannot be generalised towards all working class boys
