How do the three factors of class, gender and ethnicity affect achievement? Can they be viewed in isolation?

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Ms Adams

SOCIOLOGY ESSAY

Question: How do the three factors of class, gender and ethnicity affect achievement?                Can they be viewed in isolation?

Historically, class has been the major factor in affecting achievement, and this is still widely believed by some. However, gender, ethnicity nor class can be viewed as the sole factor of affecting achievement. For example, if you are white, you will not pass solely based on the factor that you are white, or you may be from a working class background which could hinder your chances of passing because of material deprivation among other things. Or you may be a boy, because statistics show that boys are now achieving less than girls, but that does not mean all boys will fail because they are a boy. So, any one of these three factors cannot be viewed in isolation simply because there is more than one factor which affects educational achievement.

This essay will discuss this view and explain why one factor cannot be viewed in isolation

Class can be seen as the major factor which affects achievement; this is because there are many sociological explanations as to why working class pupils fail and middle class pupils succeed. Historically, middle class boys were the only people allowed to go to schools, simply because they could afford it, working class kids were not educated so they were only able to get low paid jobs. This cycle continued until free education was brought in, in the 1944 Butlers education act, but this did not change status significantly, as working class pupils were forced to go to work as soon as the left school, and were not able to afford higher education which was the key to professional and better paid jobs. This view is backed up by Bordieu in his ‘cultural capital’ theory. Where he states that middle class children are born into the dominant culture and will therefore succeed, continuing the cycle.

Another factor affecting achievement within the schools is language. Depending on which class background the pupil is from, their language can either be a disadvantage or an advantage. Bernstein identified a set of language codes, the “restricted” code which applied to working class kids, and the “elaborated” code which applied to the middle class kids. Bernstein argues that elaborated form of language is the norm for middle class adults such as teachers and their children, whilst the restricted form is the norm for working class adults and their children, mainly because middle class children are more likely to have been socialised in a home environment that creates an elaborated language code. In educational terms, the argument here is that middle class children and their teachers speak the same language within the school. 

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Working class children are at an immediate disadvantage to their middle class peers when it comes to the formal learning process because they effectively have to learn this "new" elaborated language code, and may be criticised and punished by their teachers for using this type of language as opposed to theirs.

However, Bernstein’s views have been criticised by Labov, who states that the working class kid’s language is “different” rather than restricted.

Teachers perceived the middle class closest to what they regarded as the ideal pupil. This would be a disadvantage to working class pupils as the teachers would not ...

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