Sub-cultural factors in relation to achievement-revision notes
What Douglas and others have identified is different social-class have different values, expectations, and lifestyles which can affect a child’s attainment at school.
Sugerman (1970) and Hyman (1967) identified how working-class children are seen to be culturally deprived (compared to the middle-classes) when preparing their children for school.
Subcultural differences between the social-classes:
- Sugarman (1970) and Hyman (1967) highlighted the effects of socialization in creating two distinct, values based, subcultures
- Middle-class children are socialised into the shared values of
- future time orientation and
- deferred gratification facilitated by individual effort
- In contrast the working-classes socialise their children to focus on
- present-time orientation and
- immediate gratification due to a sense of fatalism
It’s worth point-out that many government policies are created to try and overcome this material deprivation in one form or another through 
compensatory education schemes.
For example SureStart programme, one example of compensatory education, is a mechanism for getting working-class toddlers ready for school and so are parenting-classes which seek to improve the parenting skills of parents.
sociologytwynham.com 
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