Rosenthal and Jacobson suggest that the teachers beliefs about the pupils had been influenced by the supposed test results, the teacher had then conveyed these beliefs through the way they interacted with the student for example encouraging them, paying more attention to the and through body language. This then boost the confidence of the student and make them excel because they believe in their selves. The self-fulfilling prophecy can also produce underachievement, if the teachers have low expectations of certain students and communicate this expectation in their interactions. These children may develop a negative self concept they may give up because they think they are failures. The self-fulfilling prophecy is more likely to occur when a child is streamed (streaming this involves separating children into different ability group). Streaming partly explains why schoolings seems to have little effect on existing social inequalities. Like Becker said before a teacher is less likely to think of working class student as the ideal pupil as a result they are more likely to be lower stream. Colin lacey found couple ways in which student respond to streaming one of which is polarisation this when pupils respond to streaming by moving towards one of two opposite’poles’or extreme. Pupil subculture is a group of pupils who share similar values and behaviour pattern they have the pro-school subculture which involves people placed in high stream mostly middle-class they tend to remain committed to the values of the school. Also the anti-school subcultures who are mostly working class, lacey found out that these students find other ways of gaining status because of their bad labelling this is usually inverting the school values of hard work.
Gillborn and youdell talk about the A-C economy which produces educational triage. A-C economy this is a system in which schools ration times, effort and resources, concentrating them on the pupils who they perceive has the potentials of getting A-C and this is done so as to boost the schools league table. The word triage means sorting so the word educational triage means school categorise their pupils (those who will pass those with potential and hopeless cases).working class and black pupils are labelled as lacking ability as a result are likely to be ‘hopeless cases’. Although not all working- class and black students fail some of them actually achieve their A-C grades.Gillborn and youdell notion of ‘triage’ are similar to laceys idea also streaming and labelling but they put it in a wider context by linking triage to marketisation policies within the educational system. Some schools have responded to marketisation by creating a ‘traditional’ image to attract middle-class parents this also has reinforced class divisions.
There is evidence that marketisation and selection process have created a polarised education system; popular, successful, well-resourced schools with a more able, largely middle –class intake at one extreme and unpopular,’failing’under-resourced schools with mainly low achieving working-class pupils at the other.Gewirtz describes this as a blurred hierarchy of schools.Gewirtz found that differences in economic and cultural capital lead to class differences in how far parents can exercise their choice of secondary school. She identified three main types of parents, whom she calls privileged-skilled choosers, disconnected-local chooser and semi-skilled choosers.
Ethnocentric describes an attitude or policy that gives priority to the culture and view point of one particular enthic group while disregarding others.stephen ball criticises the national curriculum for ignoring cultural and enthic diversity and promoting an attitude of ‘little englandism’. An example of this is the history curriculum trying to recreate a MYTHICAL AGE OF EMPIRE AND PAST GLORIES whilst ignoring Black and Asian history. Another sociologist that talks about school curriculum is Illich ivan he talks about the hidden curriculum schools have. A hidden curriculum is a side effect of an education, "[lessons] which are learned but not openly intended” such as the transmission of norms, values, and beliefs conveyed in the classroom and the social environment.illich say that the hidden curriculum teaches children that their role in life is to know their place and to sit still in it.
Material and cultural deprivation still take up 30% in educational achievement. Material deprivation which has to do with poverty of the mind includes things like poor housing which might affect the child if the house is too crowed or if they share rooms and have no where to study. Also Howard talks about bad diet and poor health which can cause illness and absence from school, the cost of free schooling by bull which means that although education is free they are other things that would need to be paid for like uniforms,transpot etc.poorer kids may have to make do with hand me down equipments which may result to bullying also children might feel ashamed in taking school free meals. Cultural deprivation which has to do with poverty of the mind(peoples attitudes and believe).basil and Douglas claim that the way mothers choose toys has an influence on their children’s intellectual development, middle class mothers are likely to choose toys to encourage their children. Bernstein also talks about language used between the two classes which are; restricted code used by working class context free usually uncompleted and they assume the listener shares the same experience. The elaborated code used by middle class is context bound it is based on longer grammatically more complex sentences. Also attitudes and values Douglas found that working class parents place less value on their children education. Although this does not apply to all working class parents. Hyman argues that values and beliefs of lower-class sub-culture are a self imposed barrier sugar man also talks about immediate gratification which refers to dropping out of school at 16 to work instead of staying on further for more qualification. Also compensatory education which means the government offer compensation to children in derivation this includes things like EMA’s.Keddie describes cultural deprivation as a myth saying a person can not be deprived of their culture and argues that working class children are simply culturally different. She blames the school, and claims that the working class students are put at an disadvantage by educational system and that they need to recognize and build on its strength. Barry troyna and jenny Williams argues that it is not the child’s languages but the school attitudes towards it.
in conclusion success and failure is complex because there are a lot of barriers hindering the success of some students although not for all. Also theorist like lacey, sugar man, keddie ,bull have all come up with different ideas of why people are failing and some are not they have made their points very clear and convincing by backing them up with evidence. In all fairness both internal and external factors play an equal role in a student educational achievement in different ways, and this affects the working class children greatly.
by
nigga1674 (student)
