Education- Class, Ethnicity and Gender Essay Plans Flashcards
Gender- Internal: Introduction of coursework
Pirie: A shift towards coursework benefitted girls as boys tend to cram effectively for exams quite effectively but are poor at organising themselves to be successful at coursework.
Mitsos and Browne: Girls do better at coursework as they are more conscientous and better at organising themselves. Oral exams are also said to benefit girls as they have better oral skills.
Gender- Internal: Introduction of coursework EVALUATION
Ringrose: The view that girls succeed at the expense of boys is not the case. This idea has led to a moral panic which reflects a fear that underachieving boys will end up as an unemployable underclass that will threaten society.
Gender- Internal: Double standards
Lees: Boys can boast about their sexual exploits and be seen as ‘cool’ but when girls do the same, they are labelled as a ‘slag’.
Gender- Internal: Double standards EVALUATION
Still very relevant today. Many young girls have experienced being shamed for being intimate or made to feel uncomfortable in conversations about sex.
Gender- Internal: Boys underachieving
Jackson: Academic work was seen as uncool by boys (possibly due to being read to by Mothers growing up) and masculinity was equated with being tough and doing manual work. Schoolwork is seen as effeminate. Boys are likely to be victim of homophobic verbal abuse if they are seen to be ‘swots’.
Gender- Internal: Boys underachieving EVALUATION
Francis: Boys are generally keener to remain popular with their peer group so are more concerned with being labelled ‘sissies’ or ‘swots’.
Gender- Internal: Gendered subject choice
Colley: Traditional definitons of masculinity and femininity are still widespread. Subjects still continue to have gendered subject images. For example, boys- PE, DT and girls- sociology, humanities. Girls tend to prefer these male dominated subjects in single sex classes or schools.
Gender- Internal: Gendered subject choice EVALUATION
Dawar: Still relevant today. Girls who do sport are seen as ‘lesbian’ or ‘butch’. Applicants for an engineering apprenticeship were 97% male and 3% female.
Gender- External: Media messages for girls
McRobbie: Media messages from girls magazines in the 1970s heavily emphasised the importance of getting married and not being ‘left on the shelf’. New magazines show assertive women, providing positive role models for young girls.
Gender- External: Media messages for girls EVALUATION
Although McRobbie reported progress in media messages for young girls, a rise in the popularity of social media platforms in the 2020s has led to an unrealistic image of women, which leads to insecurity and a decline in the confidence of young girls.
Gender- External: Girls’ aspirations
Sharpe: Interviewed a group of young girls in the 1970s and then again in the 1990s and saw that their future aspirations had shifted massively- in the 70s, they prioritised marriage and motherhood, but in the 90s, they valued their education, going to University and getting a secure career.
Gender- External: Girls’ aspirations EVALUATION
Wilkinson: This is still evident today as young women are 36% more likely to apply to University- a rise of 1% in the last year. This means a rise in feminism means girls value working hard in education to be financially stable when they are older. This became known as the ‘Genderquake’.
Gender- External: Differences in socialisation between girls and boys
Edwards and Davies: Girls put more effort into their homework, are better organised and more willing to draft and redraft assignments. This is due to differences in the ways girls and boys are socialised- girls are taught to sit still and read a book, whereas boys are encouraged to ‘run off’ their high energy levels which leads to disruptive behaviour upon starting school.
Gender- External: Differences in socialisation between girls and boys EVALUATION
Small scale study so therefore not representative of all girls and boys experiences today. A rise in feminism and gender equality may lead some people to believe the study is outdated.
Ethnicity- Internal: Pupil responses
Fuller: Year 11 black girls were anti-school but pro-education, so in school teachers labelled them as disruptive and underachievers, but worked hard at home to achieve high grades. 52% achieved a 5 or above in Maths and English GCSE.
Ethnicity- Internal: Pupil responses EVALUATION
Kao and Thompson: Ethnic minority pupils devote themselves more to education than white pupils as they see success in education as a way to escape poverty.
Ethnicity- Internal: The ethnocentric curriculum
Ball: The history curriculum tries to create a mythical age of empire and past glories while ignoring the history of many ethnic groups.
Tikly: Whenever Black History Month was mentioned, it tended to be in relation to slavery rather than the positive impact of black figures in history.
Ethnicity- Internal: The ethnocentric curriculum EVALUATION
More progress is being made- more black authors in English and more black historical figures in History.
Ethnicity- Internal: Teacher racism
Gillborn and Youdell: Teachers have racialised expectations of black pupils. They see their behaviour as threatening and a challenge to their authority, so discipline them quicker and more severely than other pupils. Black pupils respond negatively to this, which results in further tension and conflict.
Ethnicity- Internal: Teacher racism EVALUATION
This was a very small scale study as it was only done on one school so is not an accurate depiction of all black pupils’ experiences in school. It is also very outdated as it was done over 25 years ago.
Ethnicity- External: Asian families and cultural advantage
Lupton: The adult authority in many traditional Asian family types mirrors the adult authority that operates in schools. This means that upon starting school, Asian pupils have an initial advantage as they already have an understanding of the respect for teachers and members of staff.
Ethnicity- External: Asian families and cultural advantage EVALUATION
Wright: They do not have an advantage, they have the complete opposite- teachers often label them of having a poor grasp of English so are left out of whole class discussions and given less challenging work, which sets them up for failure.
Ethnicity- External: Language differences
Berieter and Engelmann: In the wind rush generation in the 1950s, Black-Caribbean migrants predominantly moved into poorer, rural areas populated by members of the white working class, so are subject to the same language differences as them. They use an ungrammatical, disjointed vocabulary part of the restricted speech code (Bernstein) which excludes them from education as they have a weaker understanding of the elaborated code used by teachers, in exams and in textbooks.
Ethnicity- External: Language differences EVALUATION
Gillborn and Youdell: It is not these language differences that cause black pupils to underachieve, it is teachers racialised expectations of them. They see their behaviour as threatening and a challenge to their authority, so discipline them quicker and more severely than other pupils. Black pupils respond negatively to this, which results in further tension and conflict.
