Ed 3: Bowles and Gintis

Question 1

D: What perspective are B and G?

E: What does their perspective believe is the purpose of the education system?

C: Name one other key study that is also a Marxist perspective on education.

Answer 1

D: Marxists

E: That it has 2 functions:
to reproduce and maintain capitalism.

C: Paul Willis ‘Learning to Labour’

Question 2

D: Name 3 ways schools mirror the work place.

E: Explain the correspondence principle

C: Evaluate, is the correspondence principle relevant to schools and the work place today?

Answer 2

D: Uniform= dress codes
Authority student/ teacher= worker/boss
Rewards grades= payment/ promotions

E: “Schools operate in the long shadow of work’ in that schools mirror the work place. They are creating obedient, submissive workers of the future who will not rebel against low-paid, boring work.

C: Possibly not- both schools and work value more creativity than previously. There are fewer factory jobs than when B and G were writing.

Question 3

D: Define ‘proletariat’

E: Define ‘myth of meritocracy’

C: Define ‘hidden curriculum’

Answer 3

D: The working class. People who do not own the means of production

E: Schools teach that people are rewarded fairly, but this isn’t true.

C: The messages underneath the formal curriculum that shape pupils into future workers (learning to be punctual, respectful, etc)

Question 4

D: Name the 2 research methods used by B and G

E: Name 1 advantage and 1 disadvantage of these research methods.

C: Is their research valid, representative and reliable?

Answer 4

D: 237 questionnaires and a large range of secondary sources.

E: Questionnaires:
Advantage- easy to show trends and patterns.
Disadvantage- can lack validity.

Secondary sources
Advantage- can be quicker and cheaper than primary research.
Disadvantage- can be low in validity.

C: Validity= fairly low.
Reliable= yes- the questionnaires are structured and repeatable.
Representative= somewhat. The questionnaires were only on one school, but the secondary sources were on a wider scale.

Question 5

D: In what year was their study published?

E: Where did their study take place?

C: Is it valid to use this study to understand schools in the UK today?

Answer 5

D: 1973

E: America

C: Somewhat. Schools and the economy in Britain today are different to America in the 1960s and 1970s. However, we can still see many of the same ways that schools mirror the work place.