What are material factors and how do they affect educational achievement?
This question needs to be broken down in to two elements;
1st what is material capital and what are examples of material capital
2nd what is educational achievement and how can this be shown in schools.
To answer the first section of the questions students should think about material capital such as money and access to books and school resources. An example of material capital would be school uniforms. The next section should be answer by explaining how this can affect educational achievement. For example, ‘having the wrong uniform may affect educational achievement as it can make pupils feel marginalised and as if they don’t belong at the school or within their peer groups. I could lead to bullying and isolation which in turn could result in students missing lessons in order to avoid unwanted attention from peers. By missing lessons, the pupil’s knowledge will not be complete which can affect performance in exams, thus reducing the chances of achieving in education’. Quotes and relevant sociologists should also be added in to strength and support argument being made within the paragraph.
