Education (AQA 2018 spec)

Sociology (AS)- Education

* all of my education notes (class,ethnicity, gender, educational policy before1988) there is alot of excess information so choose what you need- i made this on the week of my exams

Class differences in achievement- external factors

Cultural Deprivation

·         Centre for Longitudinal studies (2007): by the age of 3, children from disadvantaged backgrounds are already up to one year behind those from more privileged homes and the gap widens with age

Language

·         Hubbs-Tait et al: where parents use language that challenges their children to evaluate their own understanding or abilities (e.g. ‘what do you think?’) cognitive performance improves

·         Feinstein: educated parents are more likely to use language in this way

o    Less educated parents use language that require children to make simple descriptive statements (e.g. ‘what’s that animal called?’) resulting in lower performance

o    educated parents are more likely to use praise, encouraging their children to develop a sense of their own competence

·         Bereiter and Engelmann: the language used in lower class homes is deficient, communicating by using gestures, single words or disjointed phrases

o    Children fail to develop the necessary language skills and grow up incapable of abstract thinking and unable to use language to explain, describe, enquire or compare- they are unable to take advantage of the opportunities that school offers.

Speech codes

·         Bernstein: identifies differences between WC and MC language that distinguishes achievement:

o    The restricted code- (used by the WC) has a limited vocabulary and is based on short, unfinished, grammatically incorrect sentences. Speech is predictable and is descriptive not analytical.

o    The elaborated code- (used by the MC) has a wider vocabulary and is based on longer, grammatically complex sentences. Differences in speech codes gives MC children an advantage at school – used by textbooks, teachers and exams. Elaborated code is important for analysing and reasoning which are essential skills in education

·         Early socialisation into the elaborated code means MC children are already fluent users of the code when they start school; they are more likely to succeed.

o    WC children lack the code in which schooling takes place, are likely to feel excluded and to be less successful.

·         Bernstein argues that WC pupils fail not because they are culturally deprived but because schools fail to teach them how to use the elaborated code

Parents’ education

·         Douglas: Found that WC parents placed less value on education.

o    They were less ambitious for their children, gave less encouragement and took less interest in their education

o    They visited schools less often and were less likely to discuss their children’s progress with teachers- their children had lower levels of motivation and achievement

·         Feinstein: argues that parents’ own education is the most important factor and since MC parents tend to be better educated, they are able to give their children an advantage by how they socialise…