Relationships and Processes Within Schools: Knowledge Checklist

Last Updated on October 23, 2026 by Karl Thompson

This is the start-here page for the in-school processes part of the sociology of education. It sets out what the AQA specification requires, the concepts and studies you need to know, and links to the post that covers each one. Use it as a revision checklist: if you can explain everything in the table below, with a study and an evaluation point for each, you’re ready for the exam.

What the specification says

This topic is examined on AQA A-level Sociology Paper 1: Education with Theory and Methods (7192/1). The specification lists it as:

Relationships and processes within schools, with particular reference to teacher/pupil relationships, pupil identities and subcultures, the hidden curriculum, and the organisation of teaching and learning.

In practice, in-school processes come up in two ways: as questions on the topic itself, and as the ‘internal factors’ half of questions on class, gender and ethnic differences in achievement. So everything below is also evidence for those essays.

The checklist

Spec area	Concepts you need	Key studies	Where to revise it
Teacher/pupil relationships	Labelling; the ideal pupil; the self-fulfilling prophecy; typing (speculation, elaboration, stabilisation)	Becker (1952); Hargreaves, Hester and Mellor (1975); Rist (1970); Rosenthal and Jacobson (1968); Fuller (1984)	Labelling theory and the self-fulfilling prophecy
Pupil identities and subcultures	Pro- and anti-school subcultures; differentiation and polarisation; pupil adaptations; habitus	Hargreaves (1967); Lacey (1970); Woods (1979); Willis (1977); Mac an Ghaill (1994); Archer, Hollingworth and Halsall (2007)	Pupil subcultures; Learning to Labour
The hidden curriculum	Hidden v formal curriculum; school ethos; perspectives on the hidden curriculum	Jackson (1968); Bowles and Gintis (1976)	The hidden curriculum and school ethos; the correspondence principle
The organisation of teaching and learning	Setting, streaming, banding, mixed ability; GCSE tiers; misallocation	Ball (1981); Barker Lunn (1970); Hallam, Ireson and Davies (2004); Connolly et al. (2019)	Setting and streaming
The organisation of teaching and learning	Educational triage; the A-to-C economy; institutional racism	Gillborn and Youdell (2000)	Gillborn and Youdell: Rationing Education

In-school processes and differential achievement

The same processes are applied to each social group in the achievement topics. Revise these alongside the checklist:

• Social class and in-school factors
• Gender and in-school factors
• Ethnicity and in-school processes

Evaluating in-school explanations

Whatever the question, you’ll need some general evaluation points about in-school processes. The main ones are:

• Determinism: labelling theory can suggest pupils simply accept their labels, but pupils can reject them (Fuller).
• Small-scale evidence: many of the classic studies are of one or two schools, so it’s hard to generalise from them – though larger studies such as Connolly et al.’s (2019) research on misallocation to sets now support some of their findings.
• Outside-school factors: material deprivation, cultural capital and home background create differences before pupils arrive, and may also shape the attitudes that subcultures are built on (Willis, Sewell).
• Interaction: the strongest answers argue that in-school and outside-school factors work together rather than choosing one.

AQA exam questions on in-school processes

These are real AQA past paper questions on this part of the specification:

• June 2022, 10 marks: Applying material from Item A, analyse two ways in which relationships and processes within schools may lead to anti-school subcultures. – worked answer
• June 2022, 4 marks: Outline two ways in which schools may promote competition between pupils.
• June 2021, 6 marks: Outline three reasons why some working-class boys join anti-school subcultures.
• June 2019, 10 marks: Applying material from Item A, analyse two ways in which processes within schools may affect pupils’ identities.
• June 2019, 6 marks: Outline three ways in which the characteristics of schools may be similar to the characteristics of workplaces.
• June 2019, 4 marks: Outline two criticisms of schools selecting pupils by ability.

And the essay questions where in-school processes are the main ‘internal factors’ material:

• June 2019, 30 marks: Applying material from Item B and your knowledge, evaluate sociological explanations of differences in educational achievement between ethnic groups.
• June 2020, 30 marks: Applying material from Item B and your knowledge, evaluate sociological explanations of gender differences in educational achievement.

Practice questions

These aren’t AQA past paper questions, but they’re good practice in the same formats:

• Outline two criticisms of labelling theory. [4 marks]
• Outline three ways in which the curriculum might be ethnocentric. [6 marks]
• Outline three ways in which pupil identities may come into conflict within school. [6 marks]
• Evaluate the view that differences in educational achievement between social groups are the result of factors and processes within schools. [30 marks]

Revision bundle

If you like this sort of thing, then you might like my sociology of education revision bundle, written by Karl Thompson, who taught A-level sociology for eighteen years and spent twelve as an AQA examiner, marking all three papers on the current specification.

Signposting

For the rest of the education module, see my page on the sociology of education. For exam technique, see exam advice, short answer questions and essays.

Please click here to return to the homepage – ReviseSociology.com