Tag: A level

Are schools meritocratic?

In this post I apply some sociological concepts to develop arguments for and against the view that schools are meritocratic.

This post is really designed to show students how they can apply concepts to this question from across the sociology of education topic within A-level sociology.

applying sociology concepts education.png

Arguments for the view that education is meritocratic 

Particularistic values

Functionalists argue that at in school students are judged by universalistic values, so it is more meritocratic than at home where children are judged by different particularistic values.

Cultural deprivation

Schools offer children equality of opportunity and so are fair, it’s the inferior values of working-class parents such as immediate gratification that stops them achieving.

School ethos

Nearly all schools today, especially academies have a high ethos of achievement.

Pupil Premium

Introduced under The Coalition government, this encourages schools to accept more students from poor backgrounds, helping to combat selection by mortgage, which is not meritocratic.

Other supporting concepts and evidence

Life-long learning, parity of esteem, expansion of modern apprenticeships, compensatory education.

Arguments and evidence against the view that education is meritocratic 

Correspondence principle

In state school children are taught to obey authority and accept hierarchy rather than to use their talents to achieve.

Cultural capital

Middle class parents have always been more able than working class parents to use their skills to get their kids into the best schools, thus there is not real equality of opportunity

Teacher labelling

Teachers are more likely to negatively label boys, working class and Black Caribbean children as problem students, meaning they are held back through being put in lower bands.

1988 Education Act

Unfairly benefitted middle class parents through selection by mortgage and the school-parent alliance.

Other criticising concepts and evidence

Banding and streaming, myth of meritocracy, hidden curriculum, ethnocentric curriculum.

Sociology Teaching Resources for Sale

If you’re a sociology teacher and you like this sort of thing, and you want to support my resource development work, then you might like these teaching resources for the sociology of education. They are specifically designed for A-level sociology students and consist of three documents:

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A-level sociology of education summary grids

I’ve been designing some sociology of education summary grids to try and summarise the AQA’s A-level sociology of education specification as briefly as possible. I’ve managed to narrow it down to 7 grids in total covering…..

  • Perspectives on education (Functionalism etc)
  • In-school processes (labelling etc.)
  • social class and differential achievement
  • gender: achievement and subject choice
  • Ethnicity
  • Policies
  • Globalisation and education (I couldn’t fit it in anywhere else!)

Here’s a couple of them… I figure these should be useful for quick card sorts during revision lessons. And let’s face it, there is only ONE thing students love more than filling in grids, and that’s a card sort!

Perspectives on education summary grid:

sociological perspectives education.png

Education policies summary grid:

education policies.png

Of course I couldn’t resist doing fuller versions of these grids too, but more of that laters!

Applying material from the item, analyse two reasons why younger people are generally less religious than older people

This is one possible example of a 10 mark ‘with item’ question which could come up in the AQA’s A level sociology paper 2: topics in sociology (section B: beliefs in society option). 

Read the item, and then answer the question below.

Item

Older people are more likely to both attend church and express religious beliefs than younger people.

Some sociologists have suggested that this is due to changes which occur during the life-course. Other sociologists believe this trend is more about social changes resulting in generational differences.

Applying material from the item, analyse two reasons why younger people are generally less religious than older people

The first reason why older people are more religious is that as they come to the end of their ‘life course’, they are simply biologically closer to death which means they start to think more about what happens after death. This is something which all religions deal with, and so it could simply be that older people become more religious because they find a suitable explanation to their questions about the afterlife in religion.

This could be especially the case today, as modern society is obsessed with ‘youth and life’ and so religion is one of the few places people close to death might find solace.

A related life course related factor is social isolation. As people enter retirement, they lose their work place connections, and are more likely to see their friends die. Attending church could be a way of making up for these lost connections.

The second possible reason is social changes – meaning that each successive generation is less religious than the previous generation.

The church has gradually become disengaged from society and so has less influence over social life: thus children today are much less likely to see religious authority being exercised in politics, and religion has also lost its influence in education: RE is now somewhat watered down compared to what it used to be: presenting religion as a choice rather than a necessity.

Also, now that society has become more postmodern, it emphasizes, fun, diversity and choice, all of which traditional religion at least doesn’t offer as much of: people would rather spend Sunday relaxing rather than in church, and this is very much normal today.

As a result of all the above, parents are much less likely to socialize their children into religious beliefs and practices, which explains the decline in religion across the generations and between younger and older people today.

Applying material from the item, analyse two criticisms of the view that religion is merely a tool of oppression

This is one possible example of a 10 mark ‘with item’ question which could come up in the AQA’s A level sociology paper 2: topics in sociology (section B: beliefs in society option). 

Read the item, and then answer the question below.

Item

Karl Marx famously argued that religion was the ‘opium of the masses’ and Simone de Beauvoir argued that religion compensated women for their second class status. Both theorists believed that religion was an ideological tool which pacified the oppressed.

These views have, however, been criticized:

Applying material from the item, analyse two criticisms of the view that religion is merely a tool of oppression (10)

Firstly, Marxist and Feminist views tend to downplay the positive functions of religion.

As Functionalists have pointed out, it is quite likely that some form of religious belief and organisation is functional (i.e. beneficial for the individual and society) given that religion is practically universal (i.e found in nearly all societies).

Functionalists have pointed to many positive functions of religion – such as helping people deal with death and societies deal with transition and times of uncertainty. Rather than this being about simply keeping inequality in place, it could be that religion benefits everyone by keeping society stable.

Furthermore, people still practiced religion in secret in communist countries when religion was banned, suggesting that they actively wanted religion for their own comfort, rather than it simply being something forced on them by elites.

You could argue that a similar thing is found with religion today in the form of ‘civil religion’ – where people find comfort in quasi-religious ceremonies such as Football matches and Royal Weddings… again this seems to be a matter of choice, and because attendance is optional, it’s hard to argue that these ‘shallower’ forms of religion have a  sinister social control function like Marxists and Feminists suggest!

Secondly, The above theories assume that people simply passively accept an elitist interpretation of religious doctrines. There is plenty of evidence that this is not always the case.

Liberation theology is a good example of this: where Catholic Church leaders in Latin America took the side of the landless peasants, and argued against the elitist interpretation that inequality was God’s will: instead helping the poor fight back against inequality and elite institutions and attempting to bring about a more equal society.

This is supporting evidence for the Neo-Marxist view that religion is not simply controlled by elites, but is relatively autonomous, thus meaning it can be a tool for social change.

From an Islamic Feminist point of view, Nawal el Sadawi argued that Islam was not inherently patriarchal, but rather that it had been interpreted in a patriarchal way in patriarchal societies (patriarchy comes first, if you like!). She further argued that it was perfectly possible for women to challenge Patriarchal interpretations of Islam, as she herself did, thus meaning it doesn’t have to be a tool of social control and pacification.

A postmodern analysis of religion further supports the ‘active intepretation’ criticisms of Marxism and Feminism – today people are much more likely to pick and mix their religious beliefs, and reject anything they don’t like, and use religion at selected times when they find it useful. This is hardly religion controlling and pacifying the population!

 

Applying material from the item, analyse two reasons for gender differences in the membership of religious organisations.

This is one possible example of a 10 mark ‘with item’ question which could come up in the AQA’s A level sociology paper 2: topics in sociology (section B: beliefs in society option). 

Read the item, and then answer the question below.

Item

Feminists have criticized many traditional religions such as Christianity and Islam for being patriarchal: positions of power within the traditional institutions of both religions are largely controlled by men, an both tend to support traditional roles for men and women.

Feminists have also suggested that the New Age Movement appeals much more to women because it celebrates many aspects of femininity that traditional institutions seek to repress.

Applying material from the item, analyse two reasons for gender differences in the membership of religious organisations (10)

Suggested answer

Simone de Beauvoir suggested that Christianity offered women spiritual compensation for accepting their inferior roles in society  as housewives and mothers.

However, now that more women are in work, and they place less emphasis on the importance of such traditional gender roles, there is less need for such spiritual compensation, hence why the numbers of women attending church may be declining.

Middle class women especially may find the New Age Movement appealing because it allows them to ‘shop’ for their particular therapy, and demands very low levels of commitment.

the NAM is also less focused on social roles, and allows women (and men) a much greater degree of freedom to express their feminine sides – it celebrates nurturing and caring and emotion in a much more ‘fun’ way than traditional churches tend to, which again might appeal to postmodern women more.

It is also more accepting of diversity and thus much less likely to look down on women who are divorced.

Secondly, traditional religious organisations tend to encourage the repression of female sexuality: Catholicism for example is anti-abortion and anti-contraception.

This does not fit in age of female sexual liberation and greater sexual promiscuity. Since the  contraception and the pill (what Giddens calls ‘plastic sexuality’), which may explain why women are turning away from the church.

In contrast, the New Age Movement actually celebrates female sexuality. This may also explain why men don’t feel that attracted the the NAM, maybe they are threatened by empowered women, reflecting a crisis of masculinity.

Finally, the New Age Movement, in its pick and mix approach and celebration of diversity, is more likely to appeal to gender diverse individuals, as it is not against homosexuality like more traditional religions tend to be.

An Introductory Session for A-Level Sociology

A brief outline of how I introduce A-level sociology to students unfamiliar with the subject…

A-level sociology is a new subject for most students as the vast majority have not studied it as a GCSE option. This means that most colleges and schools offering the subject will need to run some kind of ‘information session’ covering what A-level sociology is all about.

Below is an outline of the 25-30 minute ‘information session’ which I’ve used to introduce sociology to students for the last several years.

NB despite the fact that there’s a little ‘warm up quiz’ at the beginning, this isn’t a ‘teaching session’, or a ‘taster session’, these come before and after, this is more of a ‘here’s the information about the subject to get it clear in your head whether you’re choosing the right course for you’ session. 

  1. Intro Quiz

The questions have been selected to cover some of the topics we teach, I simply hand out a sheet with a few ‘pop questions’ – and it gets students talking to each other, and allows time for late-comers (if your ‘intro day’ is anything like my college’s quite a few students’ previous sessions overrun, or they get lost en route, so there’s lateness.

Sociology quiz.png

A section of the ‘pop questions’ I use…

  1. What is the current population of the United Kingdom?
  2. What percentages of marriages end in divorce in the UK?
  3. What percentage of children achieved 5 GCSEs grades A-C last year?
  4. Is the crime rate in Britain going up or down?
  5. In 1993 there were roughly 45 000 people in jail, what is the prison population today?

There’s actually eight questions in total, see the Word doc below for the full, and modifiable version!

2. Answers to intro quiz – on ppt

I Q and A through the answers, sometimes doing the old ‘hands up if you think crime is going down’ technique – which works great for that particular question when you get to congratulate the one or two people who got the ‘right answer’.

intro sociology quiz answers.png

This can actually take up to 15 minutes, as there’s plenty of scope to use Q and A to tease out most of the main themes in the A level sociology specification…. E.G. how do we actually know how many people are in the UK, where does the data come from? (At which point you get to smugly say ‘OK and where does Google get the information from’)

3. Lightening speed run through of the options we do 

A-level sociology content.png

NB – I’ve actually got further slides covering some of the main questions under most of the above headings, except methods, I’m supposed to be selling the subject at this stage!

4. Lip service mention of the skills required for A-level sociology

Skills for A-level sociology.png

NB – I could add on a slide about ‘careers’, but frankly, I was never worried about this when I chose my degree let alone my A-levels (although in my state grammar school as a non-science students I was pretty much limited to English Literature, Economics and History), and so I say give the kids a break!

And that, my friends is that!

Resources (gift to teachers, modify as you wish!)

 

How I would’ve answered the AQA A level sociology crime and deviance with theory and methods exam, June 2018

A few hints and tips on how I would have answered the crime and deviance with theory and methods exam, June 2018

Answers to the AQA’s A-level sociology crime with theory and methods exam, June 2018… Just a few thoughts to put students out of their misery. (Ideas my own, not endorsed by the AQA).

Please scroll down for links to other papers!

I won’t produce the exact questions below, just the gist…

Q01 – Outline two ways in which gender may influence the risk of being a victim of crime (4)

Difficulty – easy

  • Men and masculinity – aggressiveness, linked to higher levels male victims of street crime.
  • Women and domestic violence – linked to patriarchal norms, gender roles.

And then ideally explain how they differentially effect at least two ethnic groups. 

Q02 – Three criticisms of the labelling theory of crime (6)

Difficulty – anywhere from easy to difficult…

If you’ve realised this is a ‘stock question’ that’s been waiting to happen for a while, easy, but if you’re not prepared…. it’s tricky to get beyond the ‘deterministic’ criticism.

If you scroll down to the bottom of my 2016 post on the labelling theory of crime, you’ll find five criticisms at the end of it!

Q03 – Analyse two reasons for social class differences in official crime statistics (10)

Difficulty – easy

The item clearly directs you to one application of labelling theory and one application of ‘underlying differences’.

  • Police and courts more likely to label wc/ Underclass behaviour as criminal – apply Cicourel. Contrast to white collar crime going unnoticed.
  • Greater motivation due to poverty (risk) and opportunity… link to left realism, opportunity structures.

Q04 Evaluate sociological contributions to our understanding of the relationship between the media and crime (30)

Difficulty – medium

Fair question, difficult/ niche topic.

The item directs you to relative deprivation and moral panics so you can apply strain theory, Marxism, and interactionism – quite easy.

Then New Media – so cyber crime maybe linked to postmodernism.

Of course, anyone whose done the media option will have an unfair advantage here. This is something of a problem, then again I can say the same about any of my students getting a question on globalisation and crime, given that they do the global development option.

Difficulty – easy

Q05 – Outline and explain two disadvantages of using laboratory experiments in sociological research (10)

Difficulty – easy

Just take any two disadvantages from this post.

06 – Evaluate the advantages of using structured interviews in sociological research (20)

Difficulty – medium

This is basically a ‘social surveys’ essay inflected with an interview twist…

Use the TPEN plan and just let it flow…!

All in all a perfectly reasonable paper 3!

Revision Notes for Sale 

If you like this sort of thing, then you might like my Crime and Deviance Revision Notes  – 31 pages of revision notes covering the following topics:

  1. Consensus based theories part 1 – Functionalism; Social control’ theory; Strain theory
  2. Consensus based theories part 2 – Sub cultural theories
  3. The Traditional Marxist and Neo-Marxist perspective on crime
  4. Labeling Theory
  5. Left- Realist and Right-Realist Criminology (including situational, environmental and community crime prevention)
  6. Post-Modernism, Late-Modernism and Crime (Social change and crime)
  7. Sociological Perspectives on  controlling crime – the role of the community and policing in preventing crime
  8. Sociological Perspectives on Surveillance
  9. Sociological Perspectives on Punishment
  10. Social Class and Crime
  11. Ethnicity and Crime
  12. Gender and crime  (including Girl gangs and Rape and domestic violence)
  13. Victimology – Why are some people more likely to be criminals than others
  14. Global crime, State crime and Environmental crime (Green crime)
  15. The Media and Crime, including moral panics

How I would’ve answered the AQA A level sociology topics exam, June 2018, section B: beliefs in society

A few hints and tips on how I would have answered yesterday’s sociology exam.

Answers to the AQA’s A-level sociology (7192/2) ‘topics’ exam: beliefs in society, section B only. Just a few thoughts to put students out of their misery. (Ideas my own, not endorsed by the AQA)

I won’t produce the exact questions below, mainly because I haven’t actually seen the paper at time of writing, just the gist..

Q13: Outline and explain two ways in which globalisation may affect religious beliefs and practices(10)

I would have gone for two very general ‘ways’ and then expanded on them….

Firstly I would have gone for ‘postmodernisation of religion’ – the decline in the numbers of people being dogmatic about religion as people access more and more information about a wider and wider array of religions, and discuss how the new ages movement and ecumenicalism expand

Secondly I would have used Fundamentalism as a reaction to secular globalism.

Q14 – Analyse two reasons why minority ethnic groups in the UK are often more religious that the majority of the population

Using the item as a base, you would have had to have gone for:

  • Minority ethnic groups arriving with a different culture from the host society – you can apply Weberianism and cultural transition theory to this.
  • Members of minority groups facing racism… developed using the cultural defence theory, possibly using Pentecostalism as an example. You could also throw in some Marxist analysis to beef it up.

Q15: Evaluate the view that an increase in spirituality in the UK has compensated for the decline of organised religion

This is basically Postmodernism/ new ageism + secularisation. My plan would have looked something like this:

  • Outline key features of NAMs (in item)
  • Postmodern explanations of NAMs- growth individualism/ rejection metanarratives
  • Outline (briefly) evidence on the decline of organised religion (secularisation)
  • Postmodern explanations of organised religion – doesn’t FIT PM society!
  • Highlight what NAMs do that Organised religion used to do… (arguing for the view in the question) – e.g.
  • Criticise the view in the question… highlighting the differences between NAMs and organised religion…
  • Conclusion… it isn’t replacing organised religion and that’s a god thing?

Beliefs in society revision bundle for sale

If you like this sort of thing then you might like my ‘beliefs in society’ revision bundle.

The bundle contains the following:

  • Eight mind maps covering the sociological perspectives on beliefs in society. In colour!
  • 52 Pages of revision notes covering the entire AQA ‘beliefs in society’ specification: from perspectives on religion, organisations, class, gender ethnicity and age and secularisation, globalisation and fundamentalism.
  • Three 10 mark ‘outline and explain’ practice exam  questions and model answers
  • Three 10 mark ‘analyse using the item’ 10 practice exam questions and answers
  • Three 30 mark essay questions and extended essay plans.

The content focuses on the AQA A-level sociology specification. All at a bargain price of just £4.99!

I’ve taught A-level sociology for 16 years and have been an AQA examiner for 10 of those, so I know what I’m talking about, and if you purchase from me you’re avoiding all those horrible corporations that own the major A-level text books and supporting a fully fledged free-range human being, NOT a global corporate publishing company.

How I would’ve answered the AQA A level sociology topics exam, June 2018, section A: families and households

How I would have answered the AQA’s families and household option on A-level sociology paper 7192/2, June 2018.

Answers to the AQA’s A-level sociology (7192/2) ‘topics’ exam: families and households section A only. Just a few thoughts to put students out of their misery. (Ideas my own, not endorsed by the AQA)

I won’t produce the exact questions below, just the gist…

Q04: Outline and explain two ways in which government policies may affect family structure (10)

Very easy…..

Simply select two policies and try to discuss their effects on as many different types of family structure as you can, without overlapping!

I would have gone for….

  • The 1969 Divorce act, and linked this to reconstituted families, single parent families, the negotiated family, divorce extended families… and contrasted the New Right and Postmodernism.
  • The 2013 Civil Partnership Act and linked this to changing gender relations, gender roles, equality and children in the family, and childless/ adopted families. I also would have applied and contrasted the New Right with Radical Feminism

I would have gone for two very basic ‘topic based’ areas to start: something about aid and improving women’s health and the knock on effects, and then something about women’s education, linked to work.

Q05: Applying materal from item C, analyse two ways in which demographic trends since 1900 may have affected the nature of childhood in the United Kingdom today.

Using the item, you need to use the following:

  • Life expectancy increasing and more generations of the family being alive – here you need to discuss the bean pole family, sandwhich parents, extended families maybe (and the modified extended family)
  • People having fewer children – probably most of your marks will come from this…. contrast march of progress with paranoid parenting/ cotton wool kids.

They DO like asking about childhood, don’t they!Q06: Evaluate Dependency theory essay

Evaluate the view that individual choice in personal relationships has made family life less important in the United Kingdom today (20)

The item basically directs you to discuss postmodern perspectives on the rise of individualisation and the decline of the family and to evaluate this.

Not an easy question, but workable…

General points you could use:

  • Outline the postmodern view….. Allen and Crow and Beck-Gernsheim are the two ‘extreme individualisation’ theorists – lots you could discuss here.
  • Maybe dramatise this with the increase in divorce, rise of single person households.
  • Discuss Giddens’ idea of the Pure Relationship – higher rates of family breakdown are now more likely because of this!
  • Discuss Beck’s idea of the Negotiated family – similar to Giddens.
  • Criticise PM with the Personal Life Perspective…. which finds that family life is still important, it’s just that family life has changed – people now effectively regard pets etc. as part of their families.
  • Criticise with the ‘criticisms’ of increased family diversity…. most people still have families, nuclear family still the most common, etc….

This is the kind of question you may have had to think about for some time.

All in all, quite a nice section of the paper!

Related posts

A Level Sociology Families and Households Revision Bundle

Families Revision Bundle CoverIf you like this sort of thing, then you might like my A Level  Sociology Families and Households Revision Bundle which contains the following:

  1. 50 pages of revision notes covering all of the sub-topics within families and households
  2. mind maps in pdf and png format – 9 in total, covering perspectives on the family
  3. short answer exam practice questions and exemplar answers – 3 examples of the 10 mark, ‘outline and explain’ question.
  4.  9 essays/ essay plans spanning all the topics within the families and households topic.

How I would’ve answered the AQA A level sociology topics exam, June 2018, section B: global development

A few hints and tips on how I would have answered yesterday’s sociology exam.

Answers to the AQA’s A-level sociology (7192/2) ‘topics’ exam: global development section B only. Just a few thoughts to put students out of their misery. (Ideas my own, not endorsed by the AQA)

I won’t produce the exact questions below, mainly because I haven’t actually seen the paper at time of writing, just the gist…based on what some of the students said immediately afterwards. Check back tomorrow for the updated, more precise version!

So NB – the actual questions may have been slightly different!

Q04: Outline and explain two ways in which development aid might promote gender equality (10)

I would have gone for two very basic ‘topic based’ areas to start: something about aid and improving women’s health and the knock on effects, and then something about women’s education, linked to work.

Q05: Analyse two things to do with cultural globalisation. 

Obviously I need to see the item to comment fully, but I’m going to assume that the item allows you to develop one point using optimism versus pessimism and then another contrasting transformationalism with traditionalism.

Q06: Evaluate Dependency theory essay

Easy: just use this plan, obviously modify according to the item!

NB – It’s a bit weird having to do this blind, but please do check back later tomo for the new and improved updated version, and a few comments on the good ole’ families and households section.