Education
What you need to know
The Education topic focuses on:
Role & functions of education
Differential achievement
In-school processes
Educational policies
1. Role & Functions of Education
Functionalist View (e.g. Émile Durkheim, Talcott Parsons)
Key ideas:
Education promotes social solidarity
Teaches shared norms and values
Prepares individuals for work
Key concepts:
Secondary socialisation (Talcott Parsons)
Meritocracy – rewards based on ability
School = bridge between family and wider society
Marxist View (e.g. Karl Marx)
Key ideas:
Education reproduces class inequality
, Serves interests of capitalism
Key theorists:
Louis Althusser → Ideological State Apparatus
Bowles and Gintis→ Correspondence principle
Key concepts:
Hidden curriculum (obedience, hierarchy)
Myth of meritocracy
Evaluation
Functionalists ignore inequality
Marxists ignore pupil resistance
Both are structural (lack individual agency)
2. Differential Achievement
Social Class Differences
External factors:
Material deprivation (e.g. Howard Becker indirectly via poverty studies)
Cultural deprivation
Basil Bernstein → restricted vs elaborated code
Internal factors:
Teacher labelling (Howard Becker)
Setting/streaming
Self-fulfilling prophecy (Robert K. Merton)
What you need to know
The Education topic focuses on:
Role & functions of education
Differential achievement
In-school processes
Educational policies
1. Role & Functions of Education
Functionalist View (e.g. Émile Durkheim, Talcott Parsons)
Key ideas:
Education promotes social solidarity
Teaches shared norms and values
Prepares individuals for work
Key concepts:
Secondary socialisation (Talcott Parsons)
Meritocracy – rewards based on ability
School = bridge between family and wider society
Marxist View (e.g. Karl Marx)
Key ideas:
Education reproduces class inequality
, Serves interests of capitalism
Key theorists:
Louis Althusser → Ideological State Apparatus
Bowles and Gintis→ Correspondence principle
Key concepts:
Hidden curriculum (obedience, hierarchy)
Myth of meritocracy
Evaluation
Functionalists ignore inequality
Marxists ignore pupil resistance
Both are structural (lack individual agency)
2. Differential Achievement
Social Class Differences
External factors:
Material deprivation (e.g. Howard Becker indirectly via poverty studies)
Cultural deprivation
Basil Bernstein → restricted vs elaborated code
Internal factors:
Teacher labelling (Howard Becker)
Setting/streaming
Self-fulfilling prophecy (Robert K. Merton)
