Gender differences in education

Identity and class affecting girls' achievement Symbolic capital: Louise Archer

-Archer argues that the symbolic capital of working class girls comes into conflict with their middle class school, whose values and ethos are different. -WC girls who performed their working class feminine identity, they gained symbolic capital from peers but this meant that they would not be able to achieve educational and economic capital.

Are more male teachers really needed to improve boys achievement in education?

-Becky Francis argues no, after finding that 2/3 7-8 years viewed the gender of teachers as not important.

Factors affecting boys achievement in education...

-Boys and literacy -Feminisation of education -Shortage of male primary school teachers -Laddish subcultures

Explanation of gender differences in subject choice: Gendered subject images

-Boys are more likely to choose sciences for various reasons- -Science teachers tend to be male -Textbooks tend to have more males in them -Boys take control of the apparatus in class

Boys and factors affecting their achievement: Boys and literacy

-Boys have poorer literacy and language skills. -This could be due to the fact that parents spend less time reading to their sons, or that boys see reading as a feminine thing, due to socialisation. -Girls are socialised into the bedroom culture, whilst boys are socialised outdoors.

Explanation of gender differences in subject choices: Gender domains

-Browne and Ross argue that children learn about gender domains from early experiences. They see things such as fixing cars, as being a part of the male gender domain. -Girls and boys are more comfortable in their own gender domain.

Explanation of gender difference in subject choice: Gender, vocational choice and class: Carol Fuller

-Carol Fuller found from her study of working class girls, that their ambitions included going into child care and hairdressing, as this is seen as a traditional feminine job. This reflects their working class habitus, that this is all that they are capable of doing.

Boys and factors affecting their achievement: Laddish Subcultures

-Debbie Epstein found that a large cause of underachievement among boys were other boys. -Working class boys especially are likely to be labelled as sissies and harassed if they are seen as trying hard in school. -Education and school work has been labelled as feminine and therefore, working class boys tend to reject education, to avoid being labelled as gay.

Explanation of gender differences in subject choices: Gender identity and peer pressure: Alison Dewar

-Dewar found that girls who seemed interested in sports were labelled as lesbians or butch, as sport doesn't fall in the female gender domain.

What are the various internal factors?

-Equal opportunities policies -Positive role models in schools -GCSE and coursework -Teacher attention -Challenging stereotypes in the curriculum -Selection and league tables

Internal factors: Equal opportunities policies

-Equal opportunities policies include: -GIST and WISE, to get girls into science, engineering and technology -The introduction of the National Curriculum in 1988 removed the gender divide in education by making girls study the same subjects as boys, this means that it made schools more meritocratic, so girls who generally work harder, do better.

Explanation of gender differences in subject choice: Gender role socialisation

-Fiona Norman argued that from an early age, girls and boys are socialised to dress differently, play with different toys etc. -Girls tend to read books about people whilst boys tend to read information texts: Murphy and Elwood

Internal factors: teacher attention: Francis

-Francis says that whilst boys get more attention, they are usually reprimanded more for their behaviour, so they felt picked on. -They also tend to dominate class discussion (due to socialisation) and therefore, teachers have a more negative view of boys whilst they have a more positive view of girls, who tend to be more obedient.

What are the explanations of gender differences in subject choice?

-Gender role socialisation -Gender domains -Gendered subject images -Single sex schooling -Gender identity and peer pressure

Internal factors: selection and league tables (David Jackson)

-Girls tend to do better so they are more favoured by schools who want to uphold a good place on the league tables. This means girls are more likely to be selected for good schools. -Could create a self-fulfilling prophecy of failure among boys.

Louise Archer: symbolic capital, boyfriends

-In order to achieve symbolic capital, working class girls had boyfriends. -This got in the way of education and girls would start to lose interest in higher education.

Louise Archer: Symbolic capital, hyper heterosexual identities

-In order to gain symbolic capital from peers and not be ridiculed, they adopted a hyper heterosexual identity that included wearing sexy clothes, sportswear, lots of makeup and black hairstyles. They achieved a status among peers but this conflicted with the school, who saw this look as a distraction. -Archer argues that schools with a middle class habitus would therefore reject working class girls by othering/excluding them. This creates symbolic violence.

Boys and factors affecting their education: shortage of male primary school teachers

-In primary schools, only 14% of teachers are male. -Boys can go through school without seeing a single male read, this creates the idea that learning is for girls.

Identity class and working girls' achievement: The working class dilemma: Louise Archer

-Louise Archer concluded that working class girls have a dilemma; -They either gain symbolic capital among their working class peers, by rejecting school values -Or they reject their working class identity and conform the school's idea of the ideal girl pupil. They would then gain educational capital. -These two things conflict with each other.

Pupils' sexual and gender identities: The male gaze by Mac an Ghaill

-Mac an Ghaill says that the male gaze refers to the way that male teachers and students look girls up and down, as if they are sexual objects. -He also says how boys who don't do this are labelled as gay. -Reinforces patriarchy

Pupils' sexual and gender identities: Male peer groups

-Male peer groups tend to use verbal abuse to reinforce their definitions of masculinity. E.g. Epstein and Willshaw said that boys in anti school subcultures often accuse boys who want to do well as being gay.

Internal factors: introduction of GCSE and coursework, Mitsos and Browne

-Mitsos and Browne argue that girls do better in education due to the introduction of GCSE and coursework. -Girls are more conscientious and punctual, they take more time with presentation. (This could be linked to the socialisation of girls into the bedroom culture).

The moral panic about boys : Jessica Ringrose

-Ringrose argues that the moral panic about boys' underachievement has caused a shift in educational policy but it has two dangerous effects. 1) It ignores other problems to do with girls in education that is not necessarily to do with their performance. E.g. the problem of sexual harassment 2) It tends to narrow down equal opportunities policies to simply 'failing boys' but this ignores factors such as class and ethnicity.

Boys and factors affecting their achievement: Feminisation of education: Sewell

-Sewell argues that there has been a feminisation of education, and whilst this has been good for girls and their achievement, it has forgotten about boys. 'we have thrown the boy out of the bath water'

Internal factors: challenging stereotypes in the curriculum

-Sexist imagery has been removed from textbooks, which see boys as being smart and girls acting confused, the boys must explain the information to them *must note that this is a very limited explanation of gender differences in achievement.

Explanation of gender differences in subject choices: Single sex schooling

-Single sex schooling decreases the gendered subject images. Girls who go to all an girls school are more likely to take maths and science, whilst boys at all boys schools are more likely to take English and languages

Pupils' sexual and gender identities: Double standards

-Sue Lees identified the double standard in schools, where boys were cheered on about their sexual conquests, but would call girl slags if they had sex with more than one person. -This behaviour was given status by fellow male peers, and for feminists this is evidence of the patriarchy being upheld.

External factors: girls changing ambitions by Sue Sharpe

-Sue Sharpe conducted a longitudinal study of girls and what they see for their future. -In the 70's, their priorities were love, marriage and children, but by the 90's their careers became more important. -This shows a change in the ambitions of girls which leads to changes in employment

External factors: Impact of feminism

-The impact of feminism has challenged stereotypes of women and their role in the nuclear family. -Feminists argue that we have come along way but have farther to go. -E.g. Angela Mcrobbie's study of girls magazines from 1970-1990. The magazines in the 1970s had talked about not being left on the shelf, and about getting married, whereas the magazines she found in the 90's contained images of independent women.

Internal factors: positive role models

-There are now more female teachers, deputy and head teachers which provides a role model for girls who see other women in high up positions who have clearly worked hard to get to where they are.

External factors: changes in women's employment

-There has been a shift in women's employment due to the 1970 Equal Pay Act, which led to the 1975 Sex Discrimination Act, which outlawed discrimination. -The proportion of women now working has increase a lot. They're breaking through the glass ceiling-> this could help create more female role models for women.

External factors: changes in the family

-There has been an increase in the number of lone parent families due to the increase in the divorce rate. This has changed the way women view education. -Girls see education as helping to make them financially independent and not reliant on a husband to take the breadwinner role. -Female headed households have also become role models to young girls, who see them as financially independent.

At what stage of the education system do girls do better at?

-They do better at every single stage of the education system from nursery to A levels. -E.g. by the age of starting school, it's more likely that girls will be able to write their own name compared to boys, this gives them a head start in education. -Boys are more likely to be labelled as having special educational needs than girls which holds them back.

Louise Archer: Symbolic capital, being loud

-Working class girls often tend to be loud and assertive, questioning teachers authority. While this gained symbolic capital for them, it meant that teachers didn't regard them as the ideal pupil, passive, middle class girl. -This impacted their achievement

Two views of girls achievement in school: liberal and radical feminists

Liberal feminists: They take the march of progress view, that girls education is improving and with further equal opportunities policies, there will be equality. Radical feminists: They disagree, they argue that the system still remains patriarchal due to the fact there is still sexual harassment in schools for example. -* Use the radical feminist approach as an internal critique of the liberal feminist approach when discussing education

Pupils' sexual and gender identities: Female peer groups: policing identity

Louise Archer said that working class girls gain symbolic capital from other females through their hyper hetero sexual feminine identity, so they control other wc girls by calling them tramps if they don't conform.

Pupils' sexual and gender differences: Teachers and discipline

Mac an Ghaill and Haywood found that teachers would tease boys who did worse in class than girls, and blame girls for the comments that boys would throw at them.