Education- Class and Differential Achievement

Question 1

How are pupils from professional backgrounds impacted?

Answer 1

They are significantly more likely to enter higher education

Question 2

Who are more likely to take A-levels and who are more likely to take vocational courses?

Answer 2

A-levels= pupils from middle-class backgrounds, vocational courses= pupils from working-class backgrounds

Question 3

How are pupils from disadvantaged backgrounds impacted when starting school?

Answer 3

They are less likely to start school being able to read

Question 4

How are pupils from unskilled backgrounds impacted?

Answer 4

On average, they achieve lower skills on SATs and GCSEs and are more likely to be placed in lower streams or sets

Question 5

What can negative labelling of students lead to?

Answer 5

A self-fulfilling prophecy of failure

Question 6

What do Becker and Keddie say?

Answer 6

Teachers tend to evaluate pupils in comparison to an ‘ideal pupil’ by looking at their social class (as well as appearance, personality and speech)

Question 7

What did Ball find?

Answer 7

Pupils in top streams tended to be from higher social classes

Question 8

What could be a response to negative labelling and frustration with low status?

Answer 8

Pupils may form anti-school subcultures

Question 9

What did Woods argue?

Answer 9

There are lots of different reactions to school but non-conformist reactions were more likely to come from working-class students

Question 10

What did the Joseph Rowntree Foundation do in 1997?

Answer 10

Classified 1 in 10 children as poor (defined as being in a family that couldn’t afford at least 3 things other families took for granted)

Question 11

What did Halsey find?

Answer 11

The most important factor preventing working-class students staying on at school was a lack of financial support

Question 12

What did Douglas find?

Answer 12

Children living in unsatisfactory living conditions didn’t do well in ability tests compared to children from ‘comfortable’ backgrounds

Question 13

What does unemployment or low income mean?

Answer 13

Less money for books, internet access and school trips, also can’t afford nurseries or private schools and they can’t afford to support children through university

Question 14

What can poverty and unsatisfactory living standards cause?

Answer 14

May cause health problems and absence from school

Question 15

What did Douglas think about cultural deprivation?

Answer 15

The level of parental interest was the most important factor in affecting achievement such as middle-class parents are more likely to attend open evenings but working-class parents may not go because they work inconvenient shifts, not because of lack of interest

Question 16

What do some sociologists say that working-class children may lack?

Answer 16

Knowledge and values that help achievement- books, museum visits, home internet access and parental knowledge of education may help middle-class pupils to succeed

Question 17

How do parenting styles affect educational achievement?

Answer 17

Some parenting styles emphasise the importance of education more than others

Question 18

What did Sugerman say?

Answer 18

Pupils from non-manual backgrounds and manual background have different outlooks- pupils from manual backgrounds lived for immediate gratification and pupils from non-manual backgrounds were ambitious and deferred their gratification

Question 19

What did Feinstein find?

Answer 19

Social class continued to have a significant impact on educational achievement and he argued that redistributive policies should carry on throughout a student’s entire education

Question 20

What did Hyman say?

Answer 20

Values of the working class are a self-imposed barrier to improving their position and the working class tend to place a low value on education

Question 21

What is a disadvantage of material and cultural deprivation?

Answer 21

They don’t explain internal factors

Question 22

How can cultural deprivation be criticised?

Answer 22

• Generalises a lot about differences between middle-class and working-class life
• Ignores working-class families who do place a high value on education
• Tends to assume working-class families have no culture at all or working-class culture can’t be relevant to school
• Ethnocentric

Question 23

What did Bernstein find?

Answer 23

Working-class pupils in the East End of London weren’t comfortable with the style of language required by the school as they used a restricted code

Question 24

What language was used by the school?

Answer 24

Elaborated code which middle-class pupils know how to use so working-class pupils were put at a disadvantage

Question 25

How are middle-class pupils at an advantage, according to Bourdieu?

Answer 25

They had the right kind of cultural capital and the more cultural capital you have, the more successful you’ll be in education

Question 26

What is cultural reproduction?

Answer 26

Middle-class families pass on cultural capital and expectations from parents to children

Question 27

What are problems with Bernstein’s theory?

Answer 27

• There are variations within the classes

- Working-class speech patterns could just be different, not ‘wrong’

Question 28

What are problems with Bourdieu’s theory?

Answer 28

• Material factors are important

- Not all working-class student fail