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Assess The View That Working Class Children Underachieve Because They Are Culturally Deprived Essay

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Assess The View That Working Class Children Underachieve Because They Are Culturally Deprived Essay
Asses the view, that working class children underachieve because they are culturally deprived.

Middle class children have a higher tendency of achieving more than pupils of the working class. A few explanations pay attention on the external factors outside school. This includes cultural deprivation – working class pupils are portrayed as having a lack of correct attitude, values, language and knowledge for educational success. Whilst material deprivation means that working class pupils are most likely to have poorer diets, health and housing and their parents are less able to meet the hidden costs of schooling. The middle class have mote cultural capital – they have a better advantage of their choices within the marketised education system.
There are three main aspects to cultural deprivation. The first is intellectual development; theorists argue that many working class homes lack things such as books, educational toys and activities which would help to stimulate intellectual development. Douglas (1964) found that pupils of the working class scored lower on a test of ability than those of
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Integrationists argue that labelling can affect a pupils achievement by creating a self-fulfilling prophecy. When a teacher labels a pupil, they make predictions about their abilities for example, ‘this child will do well’ - The child then gets treated in accordance to this prediction, the pupil then internalises the teacher’s expectations which becomes part of its self-image. This makes the child become the kind of pupil the teacher perceived them to be. (e.g. if a child is labelled positively, the child will then gain more confidence and try harder with their work, thus leading them to success). This prevents children from having the potential to do well, rather than working hard to allow them to do their best they allow their teachers opinion of them to hold them

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