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Social Class - Coggle Diagram

- - - - Primary Schools
        Rist (1970) - A study of American kindergarden class, found that the teacher of the class used information about a student home background and their appearence to place them in separate groups and seat them at different tables.
        
        MC students were favoured and put in more desirable groups/ seats at the front of the classroom (tigers).
        
        WC students were seated further away and given little encouragement (clowns).
      - Secondary Schools - Schools reproduce WC underachievement, due to the labels they give them, and the assumptions teachers make.
        
        Interviewed teachers in 9 English state schools
        
        Found that teachers 'normalise' WC underachievement, were not concerned by it, and felt there was little they could do about it.
        
        Also found that teachers assumed the parents of WC students were uninterested.
- - - - Language
        
        Bereiter & Engelman - Language used in working-class homes is deficient, and are more likely to communicate with gestures, single words and disjointed phrases. This acts as a barrier in schools; working-class children struggle with reading and writing.
        Bernstein - He argues that there are two types of speech codes; 1) Restricted code - limited vocab, short and unfinished sentences, grammatically simple, use of gestures, context-bound assuming the listener shares the same experiences, spoken by the working class. 2) Elaborated Code - wider vocab, longer and grammatically more complex sentences, context-free and does not assume the listener has shared the same experiences, spoken by the middle class. The middle class have an advantage as schools (teachers, textbooks, exam papers) use the elaborated code, whereas working-class are disadvantaged as they can't access what is going on in the classroom.
      - Working-Class Subcultures
        
        Sugarman - He argues that there are 4 key features that act as barriers in education;
        1) Fatalism - the belief in fate, whatever will be will be and there is nothing you can do to change your status.
        2) Collectivism - valuing being part of a group more than succeeding as an individual, contrasting with MC view that an individual should not be held back by group loyalties.
        3) Immediate gratification - is seeking pleasure now rather than succeding as an individual.
        4) Present-time orientation - is seeking the present as more important than the future and so not having long-tern goals.
      - Parents Education
        
        Douglas - He found that working-class parents have less value in education, resulting in their children having parents who are less ambitious, and encouraging and don't take much interest, as they didn't visit much and didn't want to know their child's progress. This resulted in the child having lower levels of motivation and achievement.
        Bernstein & Young - They found that middle-class mothers are more likely to buy educational toys, books and activities that encourage reasoning skills and stimulate intellectual development, whereas working-class homes are likely to lack these resources meaning those children start school without the skills needed to progress. As well as educated parents have a better understanding of nutrition (higher income) and its importance.
    - - Keddie
        
        Describes cultural deprivation as a myth and sees this as victim blaming.
        
        She argues that a child cannot be deprived of their own culture
        
        The WC fail because they are put at a disadvantage by discrimination from the middle-class dominated
        education system
        
        WC children are culturally different not culturally deprived, schools should work with it
      - Tryonya and Williams
        
        The problem is not a child’s language but the school's attitude towards it.
        
        Teachers have a speech hierarchy and they label middle-class speech highest.
      - 'Smoke Screen'
        
        Some critics argue that compensatory education is a smoke screen concealing the cause of underachievement
        . Social inequality and poverty is the real problem
      - Blackstone and Mortimore
        
        Working-class attend fewer parents’ evenings because they work longer or are put off by the school's MC atmosphere.
        . The working class may want to help but don’t have the knowledge/education to do so.
    - - Compensatory Education
        
        Policies that aim to tackle the problems of cultural deprivation by providing extra resources to schools and communities in deprived areas.
        
        They intervene early in the socialization process to compensate children for the deprivation they may experience at home.
        . For example in the UK sure start
        BUT
        
        An example America had a program called Operation Head start.
        . This was a multimillion-dollar scheme of preschool education in poorer areas introduced in the 1960s.
        . It included parenting skill classes, setting up nursery programs, and home visits by educational
        psychologists.
        . The TV show ‘Sesame Street’ was also originally part of Operation Head Start.