Differential achievement- class Flashcards
Name external class factors
Material deprivation- Housing, Diet and health, finances
Cultural deprivation - Parental interest, attitudes and values, language, parents own education
Cultural capital
What is material deprivation
Lacking the physical necessities of life such as housing, diet and income
Name the material factors of class
Housing
diet
finances
fear of debt
Ao1 housing
Poor housing can affects a childs educational achievement.
An example of this is if there is inadequate space in the house there may be nowhere for a child to go and complete homework.
Poor housing can also increase the likely hood of illnesses such as living in damp conditions where sleep is affected this means that the children from poor homes are more likely to have higher rate of absence from school.
Ao3 housing
Schools can help overcome this problem through providing places to revise for example libraries
Ao1 diet and health
Howard notes that young people from poorer homes have low intake of energy as they lack vitamins and minerals leading to poor nutrition causing a weaker immune system this leads to more absences in schools. Wilkinson found that children from poorer homes are more likely to face emotional or behavioral problems and they have a higher rate of hyperactivity, anxiety and conduct disorders.
Ao3 diet and health
Schools can help overcome this problem through providing free school meals and breakfast clubs.
Ao1 finances
Bernstein and Young found that middle class mothers are more likely to buy educational toys for their children to stimulate intellectual development.
Tanner argues that schooling is costly as parent need to pay for transport, uniform and equipment this causes a burden on working class families.
Ao3 finances
Schools can help overcome this problem through giving bursaries and loans
Ao1 fear of debt
Callendar and Jackson gave 2000 questionnaires out to students and found that working class children are 5 times less likely to apply to uni compared to middle class.
Ao3 fear of debt
This can also be overcome by students being given finances and bursaries
What is cultural deprivation
The lack of the right norms and values for educational success
Ao1 parental interest
Douglas argues that the main reason for working class children underachieving is the lack of parental interest. Douglas conducted a study over 5000 british children and found that middle class parent expressed a greater interest and visited the school more often for childrens progress.
Douglas found that the parental interest and encouragement became increasingly important as the children grew older.
Ao3 parental interest
Douglas bases his theory on attendance at parents evening that there could be a number of reason why working class parents are less likely to attend such as they may be working and not be available and some tend to feel uncomfortable in the middle class school environment and perhaps some show interest at home rather than at school.
Ao1 parents own education
Fernstein says parents own education is the most important factor affecting a child eduaction as they can give their children an advantage by how they are socialised.
For example parenting style differs between the working class and middle class as the middle class are more educated and the parents emphasize consistent discipline and have high expectations for their children. Less educated parents are inconsistent with their childrens discipline
Ao3 parents own education
Compensatory education programs such as sure start is aimed to those who may be culturally deprives by helping them improve their skills and this helps to transmit values and attitude for educational success.
Ao1 attitudes and values
Sugarman argues that the attitudes of working class and middle class cultures are linked to the educational achievement and attitudes result from the different nature of manual and non manual jobs.
The 4 attitudes are:
Time orientation
attitude to gratification
Collectivism vs individualism
Attitudes to luck
Ao3 attitudes and values
Sugarmans conclusions are from the questionnaires data but just because someone answers a certain way in a questionnaire it does not give accurate indication of how they behave and the sample is not representative.
Ao1 Language
Bernstein distinguishes between elaborated and restricted speech codes. The working class use restricted speech codes this is unfinished sentences and slang. Middle class children use elaborated code these are grammatically correct sentences.
Bernstein gave the example of 2 boys one was middle class the other was working class, the had to describe the same picture, the middle class child used elaborated code the working class child used restricted code.
Ao3 Language
Berstein studied only 2 boys this is small sample so we can not generalize all middle class and working class children. However he does recognise that the school also influences childrens achievement as schools fail to teach them elaborated code.
Ao1 cultural capital
Bordieu uses the concept of cultural capital to explain why middle class children are more successful. He uses the term cultural capital to refer to the knowledge, attitudes, values and language.
Economic and cultural capital will lead to high educational success.
Ao3 cultural capital
Keddie described his cultural deprivation as a myth and sees it as victim blaming. She argues that the working class children are culturally different not culturally deprived because they fail as they are disadvantaged by the education system that is dominated by the middle class value.
Name the internal class factors
Labelling
setting and streaming
subcultures
marketisation policies
Name 4 marketisation policies
A-C economy
Educational triage
Cream skimming
Silt shifting
