Girls and Achievement Flashcards
(21 cards)
key trend
girls do better than boys
fill in the blank: girls do ___% better at GCSEs than boys
10
what’s happened since the 1960s
feminist movement has had considerable success in improving women’s rights and opportunities through changes in the law, and raising women’s self esteem
McRobbie
study of girls’ magazines - in the 1970s they emphasised the importance of getting married VS now they contain images of assertive, independent women → girls are more ambitious for careers
Sharpe
girls are more likely to put a career above marriage than they were before
4 external factors in effect
impact of feminism, changes in the family, changes in employment, girls changing ambitions
what does increased divorce tell women?
- unwise to rely on a husband financially
- LP families = stronger female role models
changes in employment have done what for girls
These incentives have encouraged girls to see their future in terms of paid work rather than housework → need qualifications
6 internal factors in effect
equal opportunities policy, positive role models, GCSE and coursework, teacher attention, stereotypes in the curriculum, selection and league tables
what have GIST and the National Curriculum done
removed sources of gender inequality
how do staff stand as role models?
more female staff act as successful role models for girls but their being more men in positions of power than there are male early years teachers reinforces gender stereotypes that men dominate industries
Mitsos and Browne
girls are more successful in coursework because they are more conscientious and better organised - take more care, spend more time, better at meeting deadlines because they are socialised into a bedroom culture
Swann
gender differences in communication style - boys dominate in whole-class discussion VS girls prefer group work and are better at listening → teachers respond more positively to girls who they see as co-operative than boys who they see as disruptive
Weiner
removal of gender stereotypes from textbooks + teachers challenging sexist assumptions in class → removed a barrier to achievement
Jackson
introduction of exam league tables has improved opportunities for girls - high achieving girls are attractive to schools VS low-achieving boys are not
radical feminists
take a more critical view: they recognise girls are achieving more but emphasise that the system remains patriarchal eg women are still underrepresented in curriculum, sexual harassment of girls continues
Archer et al
WC feminine identities conflict with school, which they construct through:
- hyper-heterosexual feminine identities - beauty bought social status but made them othered by teachers, who saw it as a ‘distraction’
- boyfriends - bought symbolic capital but got in the way of schoolwork
- being loud - bought respect among peers but was interpreted as not conforming to teachers’ perspective that girls were meant to be passive
what dilemma are WC girls faced with?
either gain symbolic capital from their peers by conforming to a hyper-heterosexual feminine identity OR gain educational capital by conforming to the schools MC notions of a respectable, ideal female pupil
how are successful WC girls disadvantaged
increasing their earning power was to help the family not for self-made success
Ringrose
as girls made a transition from girls friendship culture to a heterosexual dating culture, faced a tension between an idealised feminine identity of showing loyalty to the female peer group VS a sexualised identity that involved competing for boys in the dating culture
Currie et al
boyfriends are high-risk - they can confer symbolic capital but girls who are too competitive risk ‘slut-shaming’ and girls who don’t compete may face ‘frigid-shaming’
