OLABISI ONABANJO UNIVERSITY

AGO-IWOYE, OGUN STATE NIGERIA

FACULTY OF SOCIAL SCIENCES
DEPARTMENT OF SOCIOLOGY

2019/2020 Academic Session

FACULTY: Social Sciences
DEPARTMENT: Sociology
PROGRAMME: Sociology
COURSE CODE: SOC 226
COURSE TITLE: Sociology of Education
UNITS: 3 Units
COURSE LECTURERS: Dr C.O Oyafunke-Omoniyi
Email: [email protected]
Phone: 08038473806 (WhatsApp messages allowed)

COURSE AIMS
This course examines social influences on education and, in turn, the effects of
education and schooling on the social experiences and identities of individuals and
groups in contemporary society. We thus will look at the effects of schooling on the
structure of society itself. There is a need to study the relationship between education
and the society for better understanding of the functionality of the sub-systems in the
society. It also aims at exposing the student teachers to contemporary educational
issues for proper performance in the classroom. Sociology aims at drawing the
attention of the student teacher to the cross cultural analysis of social issues for
better understanding of their environment.

COURSE OBJECTIVES
To achieve the aims set out above, the course sets overall objectives. At the end of this course,
you should be able to:
- To learn about the important role of education in society.
- To critically assess theoretical explanations for educational inequalities and possible
policy solutions at multiple levels of analysis.

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 - To gain in-depth knowledge and research experience in specific topic areas within the
broader subject of sociology of education.
- To identify structural influences on education, including family, school, neighborhood,
and national characteristics.
- To think critically about your own educational experiences and the ways in which your
social context and personal biography have patterned your education.
- To conduct original sociological research that examine educational inequalities, and to
write and talk about this research in effective ways.

STRUCTURE OF THE PROGRAMME/METHOD OF GRADING

 Class Test / Assignment = 15 marks 30%

 Mid – Semester Test = 15 marks
- Examination
 End of Semester Examination= 70 marks 70%
100%

GENERAL LEARNING OBJECTIVES:

i To bring to the awareness of student the role between education and the society
ii To equip student with technical know-how of the strategies to solve social problems
through education
iii To enlighten student on the role of formal and informal education in ensuring social
stability
COURSE STRUCTURE

The course meets daily, and each day covers the same amount of time and material
that would be covered in a whole week during the academic year. Generally, each
class will be a mixture of lecture and both large and small-group discussion focusing
on critical thinking and the application of real-life experiences to sociological ideas.
You are encouraged to be on the lookout for real-life examples of the concepts we
discuss (in the media, in your everyday interactions, etc.) and to bring these
examples to class for us to talk about.

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 Week 1 NATURE AND SCOPE OF SOCIOLOGY OF EDUCATION
Week 2 EDUCATION AND SOCIOLOGY
Week 3 SOCIALIZATION OF THE FAMILY AND SCHOOL
Week 4 SOCIALIZATION AND EDUCATION, CULTURE AND PERSONALITY
Week 5 FAMILY AND EDUCATION
Week 6 EDUCATION AND SOCIAL STRATIFICATION
Week 7 THE SCHOOL AS A FORMAL ORGANIZATION
Week 8 EDUCATION AND SOCIAL VALUES
Week 9 SOCIAL FUNCTIONS OF EDUCATION
Week 10 EDUCATION AND CULTURAL CHANGE
Week 11 THE SOCIOLOGY OF TEACHING
Week 12 Revisions

RECOMMENDED TEXTS
1. Adepoju O.J (2018 ) Sociology of Education Ikare-Akoko printing press. Ikare-Akoko
2. Shah, B. V. (1965). Sociology of Education—An Attempt at Definition & Scope.
Sociological Bulletin, 14(2), 64–69. doi:10.1177/0038022919650207
3. Ballantine, J., & Hammack, F. M. (2015). The sociology of education: A systematic
analysis. Routledge.
4. Blackledge, D., & Hunt, B. (2019). Sociological interpretations of education. Routledge.
5. Blakemore, K., & Cooksey, B. (2017). A sociology of education for Africa (Vol. 8).
Routledge.
6. Evans, J., & Davies, B. (2017). Sociology, schooling and physical education. In Physical
education, sport and schooling (pp. 11-37). Routledge.
7. Ololube, N. P. (2017). The place of school as a formal organisation and the quality of
Nigerian education: A systems approach. Journal of Education and Society, 7(1), 40-56.
8. Budiati, S., & Rochmat, S. (2020). The Impact of Education on Social Stratification and
Social Mobility in Communities in Indonesia. In 2nd International Conference on Social
Science and Character Educations (ICoSSCE 2019) (pp. 75-78). Atlantis Press.

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 UNIT/WEEK 1:
NATURE AND SCOPE OF SOCIOLOGY OF EDUCATION

1.1 Introduction:
Any individual can learn very little by himself. Others play a very important role and contribute
a lot to his learning process. The presence of other persons is important because a person learns
from the knowledge gained by others. Therefore the process of getting education is always a
social process. Hence, sociology as a field assists the members of any society to solve attitudinal,
character, behavioural and social problems to actualize a healthy growth and development of
such society. Sociologists therefore are people serving the society in a variety of capacities as
teachers, lecturers, researchers, journalists, workers in industry, personnel officers, social
workers, administrators, farm planners, parsons, criminologists, probation officers and so forth.
It is on the basis of this that the basic knowledge of sociology is compulsory for scholars in all
field of endeavour for better understanding of the society which they live.

1.2 Meaning of Sociology

The word Sociology is derived from the combination of the Latin socius meaning ‗companion‘
and the Greek logos - meaning ‗the study of‘. So the word literally means the study of
companionship, or social relations. It is the science or study of the origin, development,
organization, and functioning of human society. It is the science of fundamental laws of social
behavior, relations, institutions, etc. Sociology as a field of discipline is generic and umbrella in
nature as it deals with the totality of human interaction and examination. It is a systematic study
of social behaviours and human groups. It delves primarily into the influence of social
relationships on people‘s attitudes and behaviours and on how societies are established and
changed. To a lay man, sociology is the study of man‘s interaction within the society but it
extends beyond that as it deals with the organization and control of man‘s behaviours and
attitudes within the society. As a field of study, sociology has an extremely broad scope because
the society comprises of several sub systems with inherent fragmentations of component parts in
each of them for sociological considerations. Sociology is concerned about social facts in the
economy, education, legal, security, politics, medical, religion, family, technology, sports and so
on.

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1.2 Functions of Sociology
Sociology performs several roles within the society as an indispensable impetus to enhance its
continuity and stability.
1. It assists in the analysis and clarification of different types of relationships within the society
which produce such social institutions and associations through which the behaviour of
individuals are organized and controlled. It is the concern of sociology to identify why
certain undesirable behaviours manifested in human beings and how such behaviour could be
checked and reformed. For instance, within the society there are social deviants who
probably get initiated or apprehended into such unacceptable behaviours due to ignorance
and other varied reasons beyond the victims‘ explanation. It is within the interest of
sociology to probe into the fundamental causes of unacceptable behaviours through critical
analysis of the matter to control and correct such misdemeanor.

2. Sociology exposes members of the society to how authority and power are derived within the
society and why certain values, customs, beliefs and practices are up-held. All human beings
are fundamentally the same when it comes to taste of power or occupation of privileged
positions. Every individual has propensity to cling into power and authority due to the
benefits accruable from it. A dictum goes thus ―nobody tastes honey and spit it away‖
Authority and powers are as sweet as honey. That explains why human beings pursue them
daringly to enjoy the values attached to them.

3. Sociology also attempts to establish the links between the different sub-systems in the
society. It studies the relationship, between the political system and the economic system or
the relationship between the educational system and the political system or the relationship
between the legal system and religious system and so forth. A dictum goes thus, when one
finger touches oil it affects the others, there is interrelatedness amongst all the systems in the
society and that is why there should be healthy functionality and relationship to foster growth
and development. Any dysfunction in any system will invariably affect other systems.

4. Sociology intimates individuals with the changes within the society and the effects of such
changes on human existence. Through sociology, it is revealed that the society is dynamic
and transitory in nature. In sociology, individuals become aware that the society is not static
which calls for dynamism in thoughts and actions amongst the people in order to be fully

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 integrated from time to time. For instance, there is computer revolution globally at present.
Every individual within the global society is expected to be computer literate in order to
function effectively and to be fully integrated into the sub system within the society.

5. Sociology examines human background and various forms of orientation within the
society. Within the societal setting there are diversifications of cultural background and
upbringing. The environment within which an individual is born and bread has significant
influence in the values, beliefs, traits and ideas which the person internalizes,
conceptualizes, demonstrates, manifests and exhibits. With the understanding of sociology
an individual is blessed with rebuff view about other people‘s background. This will assist
in tolerating and accommodating others with differences in cultural background and
orientation.

6. Sociology also operates within the realm of human needs. In the society, there are basic
social needs which individuals aspire to achieve for meaningful existence and purposeful
survival. Sociology sets it upon itself to identify various human needs in the society and
explains how those needs are met and satisfied. Sociology teaches people to only aspire to
meet and satisfy those necessities of life that will assist in living decent and meaningful life.
It explains the danger in daring, aggressive and unwholesome approach to satisfy one‘s
needs. For instance, an individual who is involved in armed robbery, fraud, stealing and
other illegalities to satisfy his needs is regarded as an unacceptable member of the society.
Therefore, it is unethical and immoral.

1.3 Meaning of Education

Education can be variedly defined depending on the purpose it is meant to serve and the
discipline in perspective. In Sociology, education can be simply explained as an activity which
goes on in a society where its aims and methods depend on the nature of the society in which it
takes place. It is to make an individual understand the new society growing up around him of
which he is an essential member. Education in the specific term is a means of making individuals
understand their society and its structures. This will assist such individuals to open up for them a
way of creating meaning out of their environment and relationships with other individuals in the
realm of language acquisition and thought to classify and provide meaning to things, ideas and
events.

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A dictum goes thus; an educated man is positive in character and constructive at thinking. This
means that education is to provide well behaved individuals in the society and persons who have
the ability to analyze and organize ideas to be able to contribute meaningfully towards the
development of the society in which they live.

Education in any society is to help transmit to the young the culture of that society. In
performing this noble function, the parents, the teachers and other members of the society
contribute. It invariably means that every member of the society has the statutory function to
transmit knowledge for the survival of individuals. The home transmit informal education, the
school delivers formal education while the open society transmit non-formal education. It is
unavoidably possible to live in any society without one form of education or the other. Hence,
education is a veritable tool for human growth and development.

CONCLUSION
Sociology as a discipline is the scientific study of man in the society. The society is not in
vacuum, it comprises of sub-systems which man interact with as a prime purposeful survival.
There are several functions which sociology stands to perform in the society. It stands as a link
between the different subsystems in the society; it analyses and clarifies the relationships within
the society, it also intimates man in the society with the trend of the changes occurring within the
sub-systems and so on. Education is the training of an individual in line with his culture and
innovations within it to become an acceptable member of the society with good conduct,
character and behaviour for positive contribution to the growth and development of such society.

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 UNIT/WEEK 2:
EDUCATION AND SOCIOLOGY

2. Introduction
This unit is packaged to intimate you with the fundamentals of Education and Sociology
focusing on the meaning of education, its functions, meaning of society and the relationship
between education and sociology and education society. The acquisition of these basic rubrics
will expose you to the nature of the course.

2.1 Education and Sociology

Education and sociology are issues used to classify and establish the interrelatedness between
education and the society. The terms educational sociology and sociology of education are used
in the discipline as approaches to the two extremes. The usage of the two terms rests on the
preference of the expert. However, in the contemporary world, sociology of education is
commonly in use. This is because educational sociology would imply an emphasis upon
emphasizes sociological problems in the realm of education which is the concern of sociologists.

In blending the two concepts to become either educational sociology or sociology of education,
the concern and focus is still on the society. Educational sociology is the application of general
principles and findings of sociology to the administration and processes of education. The
approach means the application of sociology to the institution of education as a separate societal
unit. In the same vein sociology of education depicts an analysis of the sociological processes
involved in the educational institution. It emphasizes the study within the institution of
education. There is cross-fertilization of ideas, concepts, terms and theories between
educationists in closing the gap between the two fields.

In the study of the various relations between education and society, the sociology of education is
concerned with such general concepts as society itself, culture, community, class, environment,
socialization, internalization, accommodation, assimilation, cultural lag, sub-culture, status, role
and so forth. It further involves in cases of education and social class, state, social force, cultural
change, various problems of role structure, role analysis in relation to the total social system and
the micro society of the school such as authority, selection, and the organization of learning,

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streaming, curriculum and so forth. All these are the concern of education and sociology as
inseparable discipline focusing on the problems of the society.

2.2. Education and Society

The word education originated from the Latin word EDUCERE meaning to draw out or to lead
out ―This shows that man is endowed with some basic qualities or potentialities which are
embedded in him. However, for such qualities to be useful to the individual and the society at
large there is the need for the members of the society to be led out of ignorance, predicament,
confusion and misconception about the world around them. Education can further be explained
as the nourishment of an individual to attain the natural capacity in life. This could be done
through the training, rearing and upbringing of such individuals in the traditional and modern
ways to become acceptable members of the society in which they live.

The responsibility of training individuals in the society is primarily vested on the parents at home
and the teachers in schools. The beneficiaries are nurtured to acquire requisite skills and
knowledge to live successfully in the society. In the modern times, school has assumed very
great importance in the training of individuals because of the complexities of life in the modern
times. These complexities of life as seen in a highly industrialized and computerized global
village has forced upon the adult members of the society the deliberate transmission of the
cultural values and modern technology to the younger members of the society in an efficient and
systematic manner.

The child has to be given complete knowledge about communication technology (GSM), cyber-
netic ideas, computer literacy, international relations, vocational training for self-reliance, moral
education to curb anti-social behaviours like cultism, examination malpractices, drug addiction
and alcoholism to mention but just a few. The school is a place where the child develops socially
desirable behaviours that assist him to make progress in the society in an acceptable manner. In
other words, the school gives much to the society by training the young members of the society
to acquire necessary skills and knowledge which enable them to contribute their quota to the
overall development of the society.

Owing to the constant changes in the society, many of the old media of education, such as the
home and the Church/mosque had lost the educational function. The child had to be a useful
broad-minded citizen confined to the four walls of the home, the child will become a

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narrowminded person while the school will prepare him for life, making him liberal minded so
the school is the intermediate stage between the child‘s domestic life and the larger society.
Dewey viewed the school as primarily a social institution. Education being a social process, the
school is simply that form of community life in which all agencies are concentrated that will be
most effective in bringing the child to share in the inherited resources of the race to use power
for social ends. UNESCO stresses in one of its publications that the function of educational
institutions is to help men and women to live happier lives in adjustment with the changing
environment. It will also assist them to achieve the social and economic progress which will
enable them to take their place in the modern work and to live together in peaceful society

Society is a system or organization of mutual relations between human beings, implicit in certain
communities and institutions. Man as a social animal is not only a member of the family alone,
he moves out of the family and shares the experience of the people in the world outside. All
laws, traditions, directives, legislation and so on are meant for all the people living in the society.
Each society has its aims, traditions, norms, which all members living in that society have to
accept. Also, all societies have their cultural heritage which passes from one generation to the
other. In order to transmit this heritage, the education of the members is essential. The school
and the home help in the transmission of the cultural heritage. But society itself is an effective
agency of education. It is an informal agency and it is as effective as the family itself.

As a matter of fact, society is a bigger family where people mix together, talk to one another,
share pains and pleasure and try to progress collectively. People come in contact directly or
indirectly, personally or through passive agencies e.g. press, radio, cinema, television and so
forth. Therefore, social relationships are closely-knit. A ―we-feeling‖ is created and the ―we-
feeling‖ forces everybody in the society to look for his place in it, to find his rights and duties
and to learn good manners. The child learns the importance of cooperation, tolerance,
selflessness, brotherhood, faith in man, responsibility and so on. It is obvious that the society had
influence on the family because whenever any family makes any mistakes the society puts it
right.

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2.3 Functions of Education in the Society
1. Assimilation and transmission of culture/traditions: This needs to be done consciously
and selectively because traditions need to be selected for transmission as well as omission
depending on their value and desirability in today‘s democratic set-up. For example, one
needs to propagate the idea of ‗Sarva Dharma Samabhav‘ meaning ‗all Dharmas (truths)
are equal to or harmonious with each other‘. In recent times this statement has been taken
as meaning "all religions are the same" - that all religions are merely different paths to
God or the same spiritual goal. It emphasizes moral responsibilities in society that people
should have towards each other. At the same time education should encourage people to
do away with the custom of child marriage, untouchability etc. Education should help in
2. Development of new social patterns: Today the world is changing very fast due to
development of technology and communication. So along with preservation of traditional
values, new values, social patterns need to be developed where
3. Activation of constructive and creative forces: Education should help to build up a
qualified and creative workforce that can adapt to new technologies and take part in the
‗intelligence revolution‘ that is the driving force of our economies. It should

2.4 Sociology of Education defined

Sociology of Education may be defined as the scientific analysis of the social processes and
social patterns involved in the educational system. Brookover and Gottlieb consider that ―this
assumes education is a combination of social acts and that sociology is an analysis of human
interaction.‖ Educational process goes on in a formal as well as in informal situations.
Sociological analysis of the human interaction in education may include both situations and
might lead to the development of scientific generalizations of human relations in the educational
system.

The sociology of education is the study of how public institutions and individual experiences
affect education and its outcomes. It is most concerned with the public schooling systems of
modern industrial societies, including the expansion of higher, further, adult, and continuing
education. It is a philosophical as well as a sociological concept, denoting ideologies, curricula,
and pedagogical techniques of the inculcation and management of knowledge and the social
reproduction of personalities and cultures. It is concerned with the relationships, activities and

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reactions of the teachers and students in the classroom. It emphasizes sociological problems in
the realm of education.

2.5 Scope of Sociology of Education

The scope of sociology of education is vast and they include the following:
- It is concerned with such general concepts such as society itself, culture, community,
class, environment, socialization, internalization, accommodation, assimilation, cultural
lag, subculture, status, role and so forth.
- It is further involved in cases of education and social class, state, social force, cultural
change, various problems of role structure, role analysis in relation to the total social
system and the micro society of the school such as authority, selection, and the
organization of learning, streaming, curriculum and so forth.
- It deals with analysis of educational situations in various geographical and ethnological
contexts. E.g. Educational situations in rural, urban and tribal areas, in different parts of
the country/world, with the background of different races, cultures etc.
- It helps us to understand the effectiveness of different educational methods in teaching
students with different kinds of intelligences.
- It studies the effect of economy upon the type of education provided to the students. Eg.
Education provided in IB, ICSE, SSC, Municipal schools.
- It helps us to understand the effect of various social agencies like family, school on the
students.
- It studies the relationship between social class, culture, language, parental education,
occupation and the achievement of the students.
- It studies the role and structure of school, peer group on the personality of the students.
- It provides an understanding of the problems such as racism, communalism, gender
discrimination etc.
- It studies the role of schools in socialization of the students.
- It suggests ways to develop national integration, international understanding, the spirit of
scientific temper, globalization among the students.
- It promotes research studies related to planning, organization and application of various
theories in education.

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All these are the concerns of education and sociology as inseparable discipline focusing on the
problems of the society.

2.6 Perspective to Sociology of Education

Functionalist Perspective
Education serves several functions for society. These include (a) socialization, (b) social
integration, (c) social placement, and (d) social and cultural innovation. Latent functions include
child care, the establishment of peer relationships, and lowering unemployment by keeping high
school students out of the full-time labour force. Problems in the educational institution harm
society because all these functions cannot be completely fulfilled.

Conflict Perspective
Education promotes social inequality through the use of tracking and standardized testing and the
impact of its ―hidden curriculum.‖ Schools differ widely in their funding and learning conditions,
and this type of inequality leads to learning disparities that reinforce social inequality.

Symbolic Interactionism
This perspective focuses on social interaction in the classroom, on the playground, and in other
school venues. Specific research finds that social interaction in schools affects the development
of gender roles and that teachers‘ expectations of pupils‘ intellectual abilities affect how much
pupils learn. Certain educational problems have their basis in social interaction and expectations.

CONCLUSION
This unit delved into the issue of relationship between education and sociology. It examined the
two concepts separately before establishing the relationship between them. Sociology of
education emphasizes the analyses of sociological process involved in educational institution and
the application of general principles of findings of sociology to the administration and process of
education. Education and society were also examined as two concepts providing nourishment,
training, rearing and upbringing of an individual to live successfully in the society to attain the
natural capacity in life. The society is not static as a host of humans. It continued to transit from
one stage to another in all spheres for the comfort of man. However, these changes in the society
breed some negative behaviour like cultism and examination malpractices which require
society‘s attention.

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 UNIT/WEEK 3:
SOCIALIZATION OF THE FAMILY AND SCHOOL
3. Introduction
This unit provides you the background knowledge about the socialization of a child and the
agents through which socialization can take place. It exposes you to the meaning of socialization
and its ingredients in the personality composition and disposition of an individual. By the end of
the unit, you would have gotten the overview of what the aforementioned sociological areas are
all about.

3.1 Socialization defined

Socialization as a social process has been defined by various authorities in the field of sociology.
Socialization can be described as the process of adaptation by the individuals to the conventional
patterns of behaviour. It thus occurs on account of the individual‘s interaction with others and the
expression of the culture which operates through them. Ross defined socialization as the
development of ―we-feeling‖ in the ways and manners individuals behave in the society.
Bogardu has viewed socialization as the process whereby persons learn to behave dependably
together on behalf of human welfare and by so doing experience social self control, social
responsibility and balanced personality. Farayola sees socialization as the business of adjusting
people to the way of life of the community, usually by way of initiation into its customs, beliefs,
rituals conventions, expectation and demands combined with instructions and the setting of
examples.

Having gone through the ideas of various experts on the meaning of socialization, an attempt can
be made to further justify the meaning of socialization as the process by which the individuals
learn to behave according to the social traditions and conventionality of their environment. The
human child has a remarkable capacity to imitate others to develop according to the tenets of
environment. Being a social animal, he/she tries to win the appreciation of the group in which
he/she lives and hence, he/she naturally tries to imitate the culture of the group. It is through
socialization that he is transformed from the animals into the human, and it is socialization which
gives him/her a balanced personality. The social aspect of the personality is no less important
than the individual aspect. Socialization teaches him/her to retain control over himself/herself in
the interest of others.

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3.2 Early Socialisation
The patterns of behaviours that a society has to pass on to its new recruits are referred to as its
cultures. In a primitive society, the transmission of the culture was major part of education. It
majorly focused on how the children are given what we call primary education in the family
without ever entering a school. At the age of five or six children start to go to school, the family
has already a great deal of educational care and nurture. Much of the culture has by this age been
transmitted. Also during the next few years when the majority of children are very malleable the
school works alongside the family to have very potent influence on the child.

The schools have come to consider that they have a pastoral care for their pupils for good moral
upbringing to compliment the role of the family. But the values that the school tries to inculcate
may be at odds with those that the family attempts to teach the child. For example, stealing may
be taught very wrong by the teacher, but no one may prevent a country child from taking apples
or mangoes from an orchard or a city child from taking fruit from a lorry moving through his
playgrounds or streets. The children could learn all the roles that they had to play from the
education that they receive as they socialized within the school and the extended family because
what they need to learn can not all be taught with the nuclear family. This is because a nuclear
family belongs to one social class and mainly meets members of the same class or almost the
same social class. The exposure will be narrow and limited to the miniature environment. The
early socialization of the child ought to embrace the nuclear family, extended family and the
school for wider coverage of relevant items to be learnt.

3.3 Agents of Socialization

The survival of any society depends solidly on the sufficient degree of homogeneity amongst its
members. Socialization perpetuates and reinforces this homogeneity by fixing in the child from
the beginning the essential similarities that collective life demands. These essential life
ingredients are transmitted through the family, school, mosque/church, peer group, market, mass
media and so forth.

3.3.1 The Family

The family is one of the many small face-to-face groups that are called primary groups saddled
with the responsibility of giving the offspring a qualitative and decent pattern of living. The
family is expected to satisfy ―sex needs‖ (reproduction), economic needs – feeding, clothing,

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shelter, medical provision, and so on. It is also expected to transmit the cultural values and norms
to the young generation in order to be fully integrated into the society. The family is indeed the
foundation of socialization because that is the first contact of the child. The inculcation of basic
social values, desirable character traits and norms are learnt first in the family. The home assists
in laying the foundation for personality and character development of a child.

The success or failure of an individual depends on the type of social take-off acquired in the
family setting. The child is trained in language, positive character traits, fundamental intellectual
knowledge, vocational skills and so on, through the initiation by the adult members of the family
like father, mother and other siblings at home. These people are expected to be role models
worthy of emulation in all ramifications as the younger generation look up to them as examples
for moral standard. Frend and other psycho-analysts believe that the impressions made upon the
child‘s mind at home determine the child‘s personality. This is because the child‘s mind is very
flexible and susceptible to any influence. The parents love for the child makes a deep impression
on him. The cordial relationship between both parents has significant influence on the
personality development of the child. Parent need to ensure that they display high level of moral
maturity in relating with each other to serve as shinning examples to their off spring.

3.3.2 The School

The school is another important agent of socialization. After the home, the child is exposed to the
school which also influences him. It socializes the child, gives him the opportunity to manifest
his qualities, potentialities, capabilities, instincts, drives and motives and helps to develop his
personality. For the child, the teacher‘s personality and character provide a mode which he
strives to copy, thereby consciously moulding his personality. This is true only of those teachers
who succeed in arousing in the child‘s mind an attachment and love of themselves. Every little
action, every movement, speech made by the teacher impresses itself on the child‘s mind. Apart
from the teacher, the child is also influenced by his school mates or groups. These mates or
groups play a significant role in determining the status and role the child will occupy in the
society later in life. During the process of education, the child‘s personality develops under the
impact of the other personalities with whom he comes in contact. In the school, the child is
discipline; he is aware that disobedience brings immediate punishment but too strict a system of
discipline restricts the child‘s mental growth and may even drive him into criminal activity. On
the other hand, complete absence of control may either make him liberal, free and independent or

16
impulsive. Besides, the cultural programmes of the school also help to refine his attitudes. The
school is also expected to transmit knowledge and skills into the learners to be able to face life
challenges and for sustenance.

3.3.3 The Peer Group

The peer group is the child‘s own friends and equals with similar drives, motives and interests.
The social world of the child has its own mode of interaction, its own values and acceptable
forms of behaviour, many of which adults can not understand. It is a world in which the child has
equal and at times superior status to others. Peer groups take shape early in the child‘s life. In the
earlier years, these peer groups are relatively informal and transitory, adapted quickly to
changing circumstances in the child‘s situation. Examples of peer groups are play groups
(siblings, neighbours children, school-mates) the cliques and age mates. In later years, however
they become more formally organized groups like clubs, societies, fighting gangs, character-
building agencies like Boys Scouts, Girls Guides and so on. In short, peer groups are social
groups that influence the behaviour of their members. Traditionally, brothers, sisters and people
in the community are sources of an informal education of the child. But there is little or no
evidence in Africa of the effects they have upon a child‘s attainment of formal education and
educational success. Peer groups can have either negative or positive impact on a child‘s life. A
child has to exercise care in the choice of the peer groups to belong.

3.3.4 Religion
Religion might be described as a reflection of man‘s attempts to explain those aspects of his
environment which he cannot understand. Except in terms of the super – natural – what is the
purpose of life? What happens to people when they die? In our society as in many others
people‘s religious beliefs are founded on the idea that God is the supernatural power responsible
for the creation of life. They believe that God had a purpose when He created the world and that
this purpose has been explained by the prophets who came into the world to tell people how they
should behave in order that God‘s purpose might be achieved. For this reason, religious beliefs
give rise to certain types of behaviour. Religion is therefore a whole way of life and not just
something that believer can take up or put down as the fancy takes them. People who share the
same religious beliefs will also hold the same attitudes and opinions, and will behave in the same
way. Thus, religious institutions help in the socialization process of its members. The religious
leaders like Pastors or Mallams are expected to demonstrate a high level of morality to serve as

17
role models to their followers. It is also worthwhile to preach the authentic facts in their written
liturgies and not the manipulations to suit their personal interest and desires.

3.3.5 Mass Media

The mass media as an agent of socialization have their own technical characteristics. There are
two major types namely ―Print and Electronic. The print is in the group of newspapers,
magazines, periodicals, texts, bill boards and so on. While the electronics are the Radio,
Television, video, projectors and so forth. These form avenues for socialization. Media are
clearly in competition with one another for a restricted period of leisure time though there is one
exception to this generalization. Because the radio has the specific characteristic that can be used
as a background to other activities; the specialist provision of music apt for this purpose has been
developed as a major function. The different media largely because of technical characteristics
are used in different ways by children and hence different types of messages are passed through
mass media. Children need to be guided in the usage of their leisure hours in the patronage and
utilization of mass media to discourage cultivation and learning of negative ideas.

CONCLUSION
Socialization is the process by which the individual learn to behave according to the social
traditions and conventionality of his environment as a result of the remarkable capabilities in
human beings. It focuses on early socialization of the child in the transmission of the societal
culture as a major part of education right from the family to the school. The nuclear family,
extended family and school give wide coverage of items to be learnt by the child in order to
become acceptable member of the society. The socialization of the child is done through the
family, school, peer group, religious houses and mass media to intimate the child with the
happenings in his environment.

18
 UNIT/WEEK 4:
SOCIALIZATION AND EDUCATION, CULTURE AND PERSONALITY

This unit is expected to give you background knowledge about the socialization of a child and
the media through which socialization can take place. It exposes you to the meaning of culture
and its ingredients and the personality composition and disposition of an individual.

4.1 Socialization and Education

The teaching of the basic knowledge and skills necessary to earn a living in a modern community
has been handed down through the educational system; literacy is one of such skill and
knowledge. In the same way schools can undertake much of the vocational guidance that is
essential to steer a child into the job for which is most suited. This task is unnecessary in a
primitive village. In the contemporary Nigerian Society, skills and knowledge acquisition
through the school are tied to white-cola jobs which are no longer in agreement with the reality
in the labour market. The labour market in the public establishment is full to capacity and that is
why the graduates from our institutions of learning complain of unemployment. Literacy as it is
perceived in Nigeria is not meant for white-collar jobs but to assist in capacity building and high
level of productivity in our chosen career.

The university education needs to cease from producing manpower experts who are not
vocationally oriented to create jobs for themselves. Students need to be guided and counseled to
offer courses with requisite skills to create jobs after graduation from school. The organs charged
with the responsibility to direct the affairs of education should objectively and pragmatically re-
assess the existing learning contents to fashion out courses with skill acquisition for self reliance
and private driving economy. In the primitive African society, unemployment was impossible
due to mandatory conventional vocational training which equipped boys and girls with means of
living. It is also possible in the contemporary African setting if the education acquired in schools
are professionally oriented and delivered qualitatively to enhance independence after graduation.

4.2 Culture
Culture has been variedly defined by the different authorities in the field of social sciences most
especially sociologists. Linton defined culture as the configuration of learned behaviour, and the
result of behaviour, whose component elements are shared and transmitted by the members of a

19
particular society. In the same token, culture is seen as the social heredity that is passed on by the
social group from generation to generation. Taylor in his own contribution to the discourse of
culture viewed it as a complex whole which includes knowledge, belief, art, morals. Law,
custom and any other capabilities and habit acquired by man as a member of society. Kasper
referred to culture as a collective term for patterns of essential and normative assertions taken
from literature, language or drama or sounds in music, or symbols in sculpture and art, or
movement in dance and ballet of fashion in clothes and so forth. Right from the time
immemorial, human beings lived together in a given place and at a given time.

A society was formed in this way. Set of individuals organized themselves to lead group life. In
their social interactions, the people had common interest which makes them to have a common
pattern of behaviours. They do everything in common to achieve desired objectives. Their
values, standards and norms are reflected in their ways of thinking and feeling. In their
relationship they acquire ―a way of life‖ which was known as culture. Culture distinguishes man
from animals because the cultural traits that are present in man are virtually absent in animals. A
man embraces the world of language, art, dance, craft, drama, dress, food, literature, music,
politics, religious knowledge, skills and technology which makes culture the sum total of ways of
life of the people occupying a geographical location.

It is pertinent to stress and emphasize that there is uniqueness of culture but there is no
superiority of culture. Human beings who grow in an environment with certain cultural traits
internalize and appreciate them. Any attempt to condemn, alter or influence a change is always
met with serious resistance and antagonism. This is because it has been inherently built into the
body system like an unchangeable garment to be worn throughout life. These values attached to
culture by individuals are of high premium which calls for diplomatic and gradual approach to
change otherwise there will be instability and chaos. In societies where attempts are made to
impose alien culture other than familiar culture without due consideration and respect for
existing culture, violence and pandemonium always erupt. All aspects of culture should be
respected and accorded due consideration in any society before laws, policies, programmes and
schemes are formulated to fully integrate all interest groups for peaceful co-existence. The
following are some aspects of culture in every society.

20
 i. Cultural Norms: A cultural norm is an established standard of what a group expects in
terms of thought and conduct. These expectation and resultant behaviours often vary
from one culture to the next. They are also in different forms like the values, folkways
and morals. In every society there is reinforcement of morals like rapes, murder and
robbery with punishment sanctions by the laws for members to obey and respect them.
ii. Ideal and Real Culture: Ideal culture consists of officially approved behaviour patterns
while real culture consist of what people actually do in their day to day practices without
due consideration to their official status like cheating, lying, fighting and so forth.
iii. Sub-Culture: A sub-culture is a group smaller than a society, it is related to the larger
culture in the sense that it accepts many of its norms but the sub culture is also
distinguishable because it has some norms of its own.
iv. Cultural Relativity: It is impossible to understand behaviour patterns of other groups if
we analyze them only in terms of our motives and values. A trait which may be
disruptive in one society may be vital to the stability of another.
v. Cultural Shock: When an individual is exposed to an alien cultural environment and
among people who do not share his fundamental belief, this condition is referred to as a
cultural shock.
vi. Cultural Change: Cultural change occurs whenever new traits and trait complexes like
traditions, values and customs emerge to replace the old ones in content and structure.
Although, resistance to change is most evident when changes occur but it is inevitable.
vii. Cultural Lag: When the non-material element of culture like norms, values and beliefs
attempt to keep pace with changes in the material element of culture like technology, then
cultural lag has occurred.
viii. Acculturation: The context between one culture and another to change the existing traits
is referred to as acculturation.
ix. Enculturation: This is a process by which people become part of the native culture. This
is done through the internalization of the morals, laws and folkways of such culture to
become part and parcel of it.

21
CONCLUSION
In this unit the relationship between socialization and education, culture and personality were
discussed. Socialization and education are seen as intimately related. Both issues explain the
teaching of basic knowledge and skills necessary to earn a living in a modern society. The two
concepts examine how socialization and education should be used to produce manpower expert
who can stand the test of time in the modern society. Culture is also examined as a complex
whole which include knowledge, belief, art, moral, law, custom and any other capabilities and
habits acquired by man as a member of society. Some aspects of culture were also examined.

22
 UNIT/WEEK 5:
FAMILY AND EDUCATION
5. Introduction
This unit gives you an insight/view of the family and education. It comprises of ideas about the
family and school, family and educational agents, family and occupational aspiration, family and
educational aspiration, family and child‘s classroom behaviour. This Unit is a roadmap to give
you ideas about the linkage between the family and school environment.

5.1 Meaning of Family

According to Sociologists, the family is an intimate domestic group of people related to one
another by bonds of blood, sexual mating, or legal ties. It has been a very resilient social unit that
has survived and adapted through time. So, the element of time referred to above, is again
present here. The family acts as a primary socialization of children whereby the child first learns
the basic values and norms of the culture they will grow up in. a child needs to be carefully
nurtured, cherished and molded into responsible individuals with good values and strong ethics.
Therefore, it is important to provide them the best childcare so that they grow up to be
physically, mentally and emotionally strong individuals. Similarly, The United States Census
Bureau (2007) defines the family as a relatively permanent group of two or more people who are
related by blood, marriage or adoption and who live under the same roof. Stephen (2010) defines
the family as a social arrangement based on marriage including recognition of rights and duties
of parenthood, common residence for husband, wife and children are reciprocal economic
obligations between husband and wife.

The family is seen as the main pillar block of a community; family structure and upbringing
influence the social character and personality of any given society. Family is where everybody
learns to love, to care, to be compassionate, to be ethical, to be honest, to be fair, to have
common sense, to use reasoning etc., values which are essential for living in a community. Yet,
there are ongoing debates that families‘ values are in decline. Moreover the same family is
viewed as an ‗oppressive and bankrupt institution‘. George Peter Murdock (1949) defines the
family as a universal institution. According to him, the family is a ‗social group characterised by
common residence, economic corporation and reproduction. It includes adults of both sexes at

23
least two of whom maintain a socially approved sexual relationship and one or more children
owned or adopted of the sexually cohabiting adults‘.

Sociologists, on the other hand, tend to define family more in terms of the manner in which
members relate to one another than on a strict configuration of status roles. Here, we will
define family as a socially recognized group (usually joined by blood, marriage, or adoption)
that forms an emotional connection and serves as an economic unit of society. Sociologists
identify different types of families based on how one enters into them. A family of
orientation refers to the family into which a person is born. A family of procreation describes
one that is formed through marriage. These distinctions have cultural significance related to
issues of lineage.

5.2 The Role of Family Background in Early Childhood Education

The family educates the child on the immediate experiences. Even the educationists have become
aware of the vital importance of early years in children cognitive development and of the facts
that the home is the first of several teachers. This fact in essence, highlights the impacts of the
family background in early childhood education. Childhood is a period during which a child
needs the knowledge of the universe in which he lives, the nature of the people and the materials
in it. Through education, the child develops his sensory explorations, emotions and social
experiences as well as experiences of mastery and achievements. For a child to develop
cognitively, certain skills should be inculcated into him at every stage of his development. This
in essence calls for parental influence. For instance, the family socioeconomic status is of
paramount importance. In all societies, there is social stratification and each social class plays a
dominant role in the cognitive development of a child. For example the importance of home
factors, emotional factors, pattern of childrearing, parental environment, parental mode of
behaviour are significant factors in determining a child‘s early childhood education.

The effect of parental mode of behaviour on boys and girls is enormous, parents who are
extremely upright and stern in the behavioral pattern to rearing an emotionally stable child stands
acceptable. A mother who is extremely dominant, strict, cold and punitive has a detrimental
effect on a boy. He develops a feeling of dejection and inferiority and in the presence of his
companion, he feels ashamed because the physical punishment by his mother paralyses a boys
power of assertion. Children who are affected by parents‘ mode of behaviour negatively need to

24
be stimulated and motivated to encourage him to learn. Fathers who are keeping late outside at
night, who drinks alcohol excessively and abdicate his responsibilities at home may succeed at
rearing or producing children who will become prostitutes, thieves, touts, dropouts and so on.
This is true of the fact that lack of adequate care of children affects their future negatively.

The environment where children are brought up has significant effect on the children‘s
education. Children brought up in hostile and quarrelsome home tend to rebel and refuse
instructions at schools. This is because his home does not reflect peace and calm. In other words,
children reared in a house where there is mutual understanding between father and mother, love
and care for each other are usually friendly at school submissive to school rules and regulations.
He is also likely to learn better because he is emotionally stable. A child from modern African
family in urban centre with economic power to cater for them is expected to learn better in
school than a child from a traditional African family in rural area with low economic power. The
reason can be attributed to the fact that such middle class children are exposed more to the world
around them, and the parental encouragement take cognizance of the children‘s exposition to
modern life within their environment. For example, such children might be exposed to computer
operations, Internet or e-learning world, banking operations, communication world like text
messages and GSM operations and so on than rural children.

Becker summarizes a number of studies which show that the children exposed to restrictive
discipline are conforming and more dependent than children exposed to permissive disciplinary
techniques. Durojaiye‘s study on African children who are always told what to do are judged to
be low in originality. In other words, the more the parents authority, the less the child‘s level of
cognitive development. Such children are socially timid and non assertive. When discipline is
imposed by means of severe physical punishment, the child is depressed, and socially aggressive.

5.3 Family and the School

The family is one of the primary groups of society, concerned with face to face interaction or
relationships. Throughout man‘s history, however and throughout the world both the family and
the institution of marriage display a considerable cultural variability. But whatever forms such
institution take, they have regard to the fact that the human child is for a long time dependent for
its biological survival upon the adult members of those institutions. There are two types of

25
family namely the extended and the nuclear family. The extended family or kin group is found
and can span three generations within the total household.

On the other hand nuclear family comprises basically the father, the mother and the children.
Every normal adult belongs to a family of orientation in which a man is born and reared and
which will include his father, mother, brothers and sisters. And he also belongs to family of
procreation which he establishes by his marriage and which includes his wife and children. The
family is rooted in marriage as an institution. The institution is found in a variety of forms which
fall into the two broad categories of monogamy and polygamy. Monogamy occurs where one
man is married to one woman. Polygamy occurs where one man is married to more than one
woman. The Koran for example permits a Muslim male to have up to four wives at any one time.
Polyandry occurs where one woman is married to more than one man.

The family is vested with the responsibility of educating the offspring. Parents are expected to
train their children in school for moral, spiritual, vocational and economic empowerment. The
parents and teachers are required to work collaboratively to mould the child in school. The
parents as well as the teachers in school are to collectively grant the child psychological
development by providing him with security and love for emotional stability. Musgrave further
stresses the need that the institution of marriage is not just a social contrivance to ensure its own
security and futurity through the family.

Indeed the family has come to be used as a very specialized agency for providing affection that
helps to ensure the emotional stability needed if men and women are to manage their lives
successfully under modern condition. Emotional stability is in the long run far more vital for man
than sheer-physical excitement. Such stability in the (male-female) father and mother
relationship is reached in and through an element of permanency and personal adjustment.
However, for the growth and development of children with the family institution, it is clear that
what children require above all else in their early years is a feeling of security and stability which
the home and the school are billed to provide for the children.

5.4 Family as an Agent of Education:

The family as an institution safeguards the child during its period of biological immaturity; it is
also an institution which provides for the child‘s primary socialization and initial education.

26
Mitchell pointed out that parenthood is rapidly becoming a highly self-conscious vocation. And
it is the realm of inter-personal relationships and social interaction that this self-consciousness
operates. Socialization which is one of the primary functions of the family is to assist in the
adaptation of an individual to his social environment and is eventually recognized as both a co-
operating and efficient member of the family.

At quite an early age, a child begins to place himself in the position of others, that is, to take on
the role of others, but it is done in a very imitative and uncomprehending way. For example a
boy may copy his father by reading the newspaper even though the paper may be held upside
down. This is rather meaningless to him at first, except that he knows that he wants to do what
others are doing within the family circle, but there is little self-awareness or self-observation.
The girl may be preparing food in the courtyard to imitate the mothers‘ role. In the process of
education within the home a large variety of instruments and techniques are employed, some
consciously and some unconsciously.

The family is much more than a mere question of house training, learning a few rules and
accepting or rejecting familial sanctions. It is the beginning of that internalization of the culture
of the family‘s society which will go on throughout the individual‘s life, unless he suffers some
partial or total alienation from that culture. It is true that his home and family may assist him in
his internalization. It is equally true however that the very constellation of ideas, beliefs and
practices of parents may militate against such internalization. Many children are unfitted for their
society by the very teaching or lack of it provided by their parents.

Moreover, the role-relationships which are required in the society may be totally lacking in the
home not necessarily because it is a ―bad home‖ in the generally accepted sense of the term but
because the beliefs of the parents are restricted and restricting. There may be a conflict of
loyalties developed in the child through his early education which will result in an ambivalence
of feelings and relationships. The failure or success of any society depends solidly on the type of
family organization present.

These roles are further summarised as:

i. Childhood is a period during which a child needs the knowledge of the universes in which
he lives, the nature of the people and materials in it. This is the period when the child
develops his sensory explorations, emotions and social experiences as well as experiences of

27
 mastery and achievements. Within this period the child is still under the care of his/her
parents at home, precisely before the school age. This is the period when parents are
expected to be role model and totally devoted to the care and nurture of the child to develop
the innate potentialities in him/her to the fullest.
ii. The family is vested with the responsibility of educating the off springs in accordance to the
norms and values of the society before transferring him/her to school which is expected to
consolidate on the home training by collectively granting the child psychological
development through the provision of security and love for emotional stability and proper
academic take-off in the school.
iii. Family is an educational agent primarily responsible for socialization processes to lay solid
foundation for other agents in the rearing of children.
iv. Family and occupational aspiration. In the primitive African society, the family solely
determines the occupational aspiration of every child. In the contemporary situation also the
social class of parents is significantly responsible for the occupational aspiration of a child.

Conclusion
The role of family background in early childhood education was addressed as a period to develop
the cognitive skills in a child in preparation for schooling. The relationship between family and
school was discussed as two inseparable agents of education. The family is also regarded as the
fundamental educational agents upon which other agents mount their construction to produce a
socially acceptable human.

28
 UNIT/WEEK 6:
EDUCATION AND SOCIAL STRATIFICATION
6. Introduction
Change, they say, is constant. From the systems point of view, organisations and their
environments are interrelated and interdependent. Consequently, changes in either of the internal
and external environments of organisations are capable of inducing changes in the way they are
managed. It, therefore, becomes necessary that management should monitor environmental
factors, understand change processes, and know how to predict and manage change.

6.1 Meaning of Social Stratification

The concept of social stratification is found in every society and often refers to society's
categorization of its people into groups based on socioeconomic factors like wealth, income,
race, education, gender, occupation, and social status, or derived power. Social
stratification means division of society into different strata or layers. It involves a hierarchy of
social groups. Social stratification refers to a system by which a society ranks categories of
people in a hierarchy.

The concept of social stratification could be related to the classic parable by George Orwell
which stipulates that ―All Animals are equal but some are more equal than the others‖. This
parable is a fitting introduction, which is centrally concerned with the inequalities of privilege on
the part of the constituent groups of society which compares and ranks individuals and groups.
These comparisons are valuations or judgment of relative worth and when members of a group
agree, those judgments of relative worth are social valuations. All societies differentiate their
members in terms of roles. Some roles are regarded as more important or socially more valuable
than others and the persons who perform more highly esteemed roles are rewarded more highly.
When groups are ranked with some degree of performance, there is stratification. Hence, the
process by which individuals and groups are ranked in a more or less enduring hierarchy of
status is known as stratification.

The most important aspect of social stratification is the extremely important point of social
inequality. Some individuals and groups are rated higher than others and such differences in
rating reflect differences in opportunities and privileges. For example, using survey research
methods and national representative sample, it has been found that Doctors are rated higher than

29
other professions that is, as a class, they have a higher prestige rating. It is not entirely clear on
what bases these prestige ratings are made, but some of the considerations are said to be the
amount of training required and the degree of responsibility for public welfare. For instance,
income is a factor in occupational prestige but it is not the only factor. The other factor used in
prestige ratings are academic qualifications, cultural positions like traditional rulers and chiefs,
labour employment like industrialists, owners of companies, public office holders like
politicians, senators, ministers, commissioners, counselors and other political appointees are also
considered in prestige ratings most especially in Nigeria.

6.2 Agents of Social Stratification

The family, school and occupation as agents of social stratification reflect different categories of
statuses and social class in family background, school type and career choice of children.
Children from solid socio-economic background are likely to perform better than those from
weak background, those who attend standard schools are likely to be open to better learning
environment than those in poorly equipped schools while those who offer professional courses
are likely to succeed better in life than those with less prestigious courses.

1. The Family
The family plays the most significant role in the development of an individual. Frend believed
that the impressions made upon the child‘s personality as an adult by the family is very crucial.
There are also factors of social environment that may affect a child which include the
occupational status of his parents, the parents‘ attitude towards their children schooling and the
expectations they have for their children. A child from a higher socio-economic background has
advantages over the child from the socio-economically lower class. In a higher class, there may
be a television set, radio, picture, reading and writing materials all of which help to prepare a
child for learning in school. It is hypothesized that parents of upper socio-economic classes have
more positive attitudes towards their children‘s schooling and have high expectations and
standards for their children. The parent‘s ability to provide books and equipment for school,
combined with a positive attitude, stimulate the children to learn.

Furthermore, the upper class child eats a balanced diet and thus has good health. Again, the
values he is exposed to at home are similar to what he finds in school and therefore he is able to
adjust easily to school life. A feeling of belonging to a comfortable social school environment

30
further helps him to show his best (Dubey1973). A child from a lower class is handicapped in
some ways because there are few facilities at home to prepare him for school. He may suffer
illhealth and even finds it difficult to make satisfactory adjustment at school. It follows logically
that when one has a poor educational background; he/she has limited chances of taking the very
highly respected and well paid jobs. The job in turn largely determines one‘s social class. The
educational system appears to be a conscious attempt to perpetuate dominance by those who
already have the greater advantages in the society.

2. The School
Social stratification within the school, commonly known as streaming, refers to the division of
school children into age groups according to ability and intelligence. The brightest children are
made to form one class while those that follow in ability form another class. The children are
divided into groups, purely according to the merit of the individual. This type of grouping has
produced argument among experts in the educational field. Some favour streaming in that a child
can freely participate in a class of his own ability, they argue that putting bright and dull ones
together creates problems for both categories of children. The bright ones are kept waiting
unduly for the less bright ones, but the latter are normally at advantage since teachers are more
sensitive to their bright pupils responses. The opposite argument is that it is better to put both
bright and dull ones together as the bright children encourage dull ones, and the latter are
therefore at an advantage. Further, it is a more democratic way to educate children. Most of the
children who are average tend to be forgotten by those in favour of streaming. Dubey (1973)
observed that the division of children into groups according to ability and intelligence is
sometimes the result of one intelligence test only, normally tending to be of advantage to upper
class children. This is not necessary because children from any one socio-economic class are
intelligent because intelligence test reflects the academic ability of the child. The child from the
more advantaged social environment therefore gets better marks due to his earlier opportunities
for learning. Hargreaves (1965) observed that big problem seems to be the impact that streaming
has on children‘s attitude self-image and ultimately their performance. Teachers, too tend to
reinforce the particular status, image of the child, they tend to adjust their expectations according
to whether the child is in the ―A‖ stream or the ―B‖ stream. There are other ways in which
schools make apparent to students to come to know how they are evaluated on their school

31
performance. They come to understand that rewards are associated with performance. The status
they will come to occupy is related to how well they perform tasks to which they are assigned.

3. Occupation
In modern societies, roles have become very diverse and complex. Skills are learned through
formal education systems, and education has a lot to do with employment, the occupation one
follows is mostly related to the skills and knowledge which one has acquired. For example, a
man does not become a doctor unless he has undergone the training and has successfully passed
all the theoretical and practical tests and examinations. In the roles played within society,
therefore they are differences in rewards received by individuals playing these roles. An
individual‘s role is determined by what work he does or by the position which he occupies. The
basis of valuing professions and occupations differ from society to society. Some professions and
occupations are valued on a rational or logical basis. For example, the length of time spent in
training for a job may determine one‘s reward, as in the case of medical doctors who spend six
years in training in the university; he generally receives a larger salary than someone who has
spent three years at university training for a job. Some professions and occupations are valued on
the basis of the role which one plays in the day-to-day human life in a society. Those who work
in departments considered as most essential to the society receive greater reward in terms of
salary, privileges and respect from the society. Some jobs are valued purely on a historical basis.
For example, in Nigeria the Police force as a profession has been distrusted by the public,
because during the colonial period, it was perceived that the government introduced the police
force to suppress the citizens if they agitated for freedom. Another possible source of disrespect
may be the relatively low educational level of policemen. The position one holds or occupies in
the society in which one is engaged, the salary, the privileges and social prestige one receives all
go to sharpen the style of life of people according to the way they are classified or stratified. We
can for example, recognize the position a person occupies or enjoys in the society through his
dressing or speech and so on

6.3 Education Implication of Social Stratification

In analyzing educational issues, it must be borne in mind that there exist class and group
structure, where vital facts emerge regarding such concepts as power, status, prestige, life
chances, life styles, pattern of consumption, leisure activities and occupations. There are also
closely related issues of human development such as culture, education and socialization which

32
have implication for stratification. In all the ramifications of the literature on class as social
groupings, it is not easy for anyone, whether pundit or dilettante, to obtain any final and clear cut
view on social stratification. However, the fact remains that people can be classified according to
occupational prestige, income, education or other closely associated indicators of social status
and that such classification are not merely statistical categories but reflect differences in values,
goals, attitudes and behaviours within the educational realm.

The children are not open to equal educational opportunity even with the compulsory and free
education provided for them. Some children from low socio-economic class with natural
endowment do not have equal access to qualitative education but rural and ill equipped schools.
The public schools which are free are not properly funded to reflect the right standard to deliver
the right tutelage to the students. Many of the students from this low social economic class are
undermined with poor health and malformed physique due to poor feeding, ignorance and
carelessness which may invariably give rise to poor performance academically. There are wide
differences in performance between children. Some dropouts before completing primary school,
others have to repeat classes, majority of candidates fail the secondary entrance examination.

In the conduct of internal and commercial examination, children are not expected to perform
equally due to differences in intelligence quotient (I.Q), parents‘ social status, infrastructural
facilities in schools, teachers‘ attitude towards work, pupils‘ attitude towards study and so forth.
All these demonstrate educational implications for stratification. Within the education system,
there are different streams which can be followed leading to a variety of qualifications and
possible occupations. These streams may be officially equal but are generally considered to be
unequal. For example, in Africa, technical education is generally considered to be inferior to
academic education.

The teachers in the universities feel better laced than lecturers in Colleges of education and
Polytechnics with the same qualifications from the same universities, the pupils and students
who attend private schools like Nursery/Primary schools, secondary and universities think they
went through better school than those who attend public schools of the same category. There are
also differences between the students who attend Unity schools and those who attend local or
state owned secondary schools. There is also a gifted secondary school established by the
Federal Government to cater for the needs of talented students which equally emphasizes

33
imbalance in the educational system. Schools and colleges are theoretically equal following the
same syllabus and leading to the same qualifications. There is a very wide assumption in status,
quality and the market value of the qualification obtained. Thus private schools may be of a
higher or lower quality than government schools, places in high statues schools will be more
difficult to obtain than places in lower statues schools, colleges and universities may be more
marketable than the same qualifications earned elsewhere.

In most advertisements, it is always stated that qualifications should be from a recognized

university. This is because some schools, colleges and universities are not duly registered with
the appropriate authorities as a result they are recognized as low status schools, colleges and
universities. There are a lot of those colleges and universities across the soil of Nigeria where
people have obtained qualifications and they are disregarded in Nigeria. In the same vein, many
Satellite Campuses and study centers are regarded as auctioning centre where certificates are
been sold without adherence to laid down procedures and rules for the award of such certificates,
as such they are regarded as low status schools.

34
 UNIT/WEEK 7:
THE SCHOOL AS A FORMAL ORGANIZATION

7.1 Introduction
The purpose of schooling is the transmission of culture, the process by which the culture of a
society is passed on to its children. Individuals learn their culture; acquire knowledge, beliefs,
values, and norms. Agents of socialization are people, groups and/or institutions that influence
self-concepts, emotions, attitudes and behaviour. This influence occurs in small groups and in
society, and it may be the result of direct and overt explicit social pressure, or it may be subtle,
insidious, and unconscious. This influence acts on the individual‘s attitude, beliefs, and
behaviours to conform to the influencing group‘s beliefs, behaviours, and attitudes.

7.2 Meaning of School System

The school is the agent responsible for socializing groups of children and young people on
specific skills and values in a society. As the most stable and formal socializing agent, in
American society today, the school is expected to both train the individual for practical
occupations and skills and to provide the individual with basic societal values, like loyalty to
country, politeness, etc. Therefore, the school exercises strategic power relations as a means and
as an end to teach conformity, and in so doing some students learn to become agents in its
service, while others learn to oppose it. The school system has always been charged with the task
of promoting conformity.

School is an institution or building in which children, youth and adults receive education. In
order to convey the intended education, lessons are taught. Usually school lessons require that
the person‗s previous knowledge be adjusted to his or her knowledge of the school lesson. What
happens in a particular lesson then becomes part of the participant‗s knowledge. Societies have
seen the development of institutions that assist in the transmission of culture, such as family,
school, religion, mass media, peer group, etc. Contemporary society has developed and
established three main agents of socialization that have served to perpetuate it. The three
traditional agents that have consistently perpetuated society have been the family, the church,
and the school. These traditional institutions support continuity of thought, morals, values, and
other tenets the culture considers important.

35
School is an important part of the society. It is known as Social Organization because it is the
school which provides an exposure to Educands and it prepares the students to occupy social
roles according to their capacities after receiving the school. School is considered as a second
home for students because it is school where in students passes most of the time of his day and
this is utilized in form of learning. Every educand learns about social life, Social Norms and
Social Believes etc. So in the process of Socialization, School plays a very significant role.

Schools are the agents responsible for socializing groups of children and young people on
specific skills and values in a society (Henslin, 1999:77-78). Appelbaum and Chambliss
(1997:120) argue that this socializing agent probably contributes most to social conformity. The
school system has become the glue that holds society together. The education system has served
the purpose of catalyst when movement and dynamism was required or the purpose of stabilizer
when society needed to put on the breaks. The school system responds to society‘s needs, and
complies with society‘s demands, for trained workers, intellectual citizens, and well-educated
citizens. The school system has always operated within specific parameters and has been charged
with the task of promoting conformity.

7.3 Roles of the School as an Agent

Schools are social systems and they are important organisations that prepare children for
adulthood and there are strong working mechanisms that have effect on the quality of education
(Bozkuş, 2014). Systems theory was first formally proposed in the 1940s by biologist von
Bertalanffy (1934) and was furthered by Ross Ashby in 1956. von Bertalanffy was both reacting
against reductionism and attempting to revive the unity of science. He emphasised that real
systems are open to, and interact with, their environments, and that they can acquire qualitatively
new properties through emergence, resulting in continual evolution. Rather than reducing an
entity (for example, the human body) to the properties of its parts or elements (organs and cells),
systems theory focuses on the arrangement of, and relations between, the parts which connect
into a whole. This particular organisation determines a system, which is independent of the
concrete substance of the elements (particles, cells, transistors, people, and so on). Similar
concepts and principles of organisation underlie the different disciplines (physics, biology,
technology, sociology, etc.), providing a basis for their unification. Systems concepts include
environment, boundary, input, output, process, state, hierarchy, goal-directedness, and
information (Berrisford, 2016)
36
A social system is a group of elements and activities that interact and constitute a single social
entity. This statement implies that a social system is creative because it has properties and
purpose over and above its parts and relationships. Educated individuals are, for example, the
output of the constituent parts of a school. A social system, more specifically, is composed of
subunits, elements, and subsystems that are interrelated within relatively stable patterns of social
order and is distinguished from its environment by a clearly defined boundary (Longress, 2000).
In other words, it is an assemblage of various elements that have linkages, which constitute a
recognisably delimited aggregate of dynamic elements that are in some ways interconnected and
interdependent and continue to operate together according to laws and in such a way so as to
produce some basic characteristics (Ololube, 2013). Applying the system theory to the school
system entails the following basic futures:
- The school system is viewed as a single home because the component parts work for the
good of the system;
- The interdependence of the component parts is often put into focus, thus no part works in
isolation;
- There is recognition of the need for compromise and trade off among the various
components in the school system; and
- The problems within the school system are defined in systematic terms. Thus, the school
system follows a systematic analysis in decision making and problem solving.
7.4 FUNCTIONS OF SCHOOL
1) The first and the foremost function of School is to transmit knowledge and Skills to the
younger generation. So in the process of Socialization the younger generation can utilize the
knowledge and Skills. They become aware about Social rights, rules, regulations and Social
believers so that they live according to their own ideas and knowledge.

2) All schools impart knowledge of 3RS i.e. Reading, Writing and Arithmetic which help
students to skilfully manage the household affairs and also matters concerning everyday life.
These 3RS are converted into 7RS i.e. Reading, Writing, Arithmetic, Relationship,
Responsibilities, Recreation only through School education because it makes educands
familiar about Social responsibility as a Social being. They develop thinking skill so
recreation lies in their behaviour.

37
3). School protects the historical continuity of society. It performs the function of acquainting
the new generation with ancient myths and legends and maintaining the patterns of
behaviour in the form of traditions and customs. So students become aware about ancient
myths and legends and behaviour thereby they behave in a particular social way. Ex. By
performing drama.

4). The school is like a family, a social; institution which socializes the individual and provides
him some experience in social control therefore , the individual will learn to accept the kind
of social control that is imposed on him in school and will also demand similar social
control from society for this reason , there is a great insistence in democratic countries that
the atmosphere in the school should be democratic.

5). School fosters all round development of personality Students, physical, mental, emotional
and social . School involves all students in different co- curricular activities so that students
develop physically, mentally and socially. E.g. Curricular activities like Puzzles, games,
group discussion, sport related to the curriculum. Which develop students physically,
socially and mentally thinking skills and co – curricular or extra activities including debate,
elocution, competition, drawing etc.. develop individual differences and particular skills to
educands. They also develop social leadership qualities other political leadership traits
etc.which indirectly help every individual to be a social being that mean every individual are
socialized by such activities.

6). The school provides social environment before children by organizing students unions,
social service camp, social functions and parents- teacher association etc.. So that all the
socially desirable values namely sympathy, co- operation, tolerance, social awakening and
discipline are developed in them.

7). School works under the light of social ideals and develop the child with reference to such
ideals and aims. School encourages children to come in active contact with the libraries and
youth welfare countries organized by the community or Govt.

8). The miniature school life is brought into active and lively contact with wider world out-sides
that means school provides a conducive climate. The head masters and teachers allow

38
 freedom to the students which make them more responsible. They impart knowledge of
social customs and traditions and develop values of society among students.

CONCLUSION
School is a Garden, Teacher is a Gardner and Student is a Tender Plant. Thus we can say that
school plays an important role in process of socialization. Schools are established to assemble
people for the purpose of education and training. Schools are located in all geographical areas
and they occupy a particular environment, they have boundaries, inputs, outputs, processes and
information mechanism backed by the laws of the society. Schooling denotes the totality of
efforts put in place to help teachers impart knowledge to learners.

39
 UNIT/WEEK 8:
EDUCATION AND SOCIAL VALUES

8. Introduction
This unit is designed to acquaint you with the basic knowledge about the home and social values.
It includes salient areas such as school and moral values, religion and moral values, tradition and
moral values such that you understand the meaning of moral value, and the areas of coverage in
the school religious house, home and the traditions in the society.

8.1 Education and Social Values

Social living is saturated with moral evaluations which show that no moral living takes places in
a vacuum. It is impossible to draw any limits to it. Moral values are moral exhibitions that are
acceptable, cherished, appreciated and appraised by the members of any given society. These
values are in the group of love sharing, honesty display, patriotism, loyalty, truthfulness and so
forth. These values enhance peaceful co-existence in any given society. It also brings about
progress, growth and development because the existing resources stand the chance of being
distributed equitably and fairly.

In any country there are vices within the society that are against the moral values. Some of these
vices are corruption, armed robbery, stealing, raping, cultism, examination malpractices, rioting,
assassination, touting, thuggery and so forth which attract serious sanctions in the law court. It is
a serious misgiving to think that moral education is limited to the area of sexual relationships.
Morality is of course concerned with all relationships between persons in human society and it is
the wide moral confusion of our times that arouses concern. The idea of tying moral education to
religious doctrines and teachings is grossly inadequate because of the plurality of ideas and
codes.

Moral education need to embrace the societal values and virtues which are rooted in culture. This
is because there are variations in cultural origin. What is acceptable in some cultural setting are
under questioning in other places. In examining morality the non material aspect of culture need
to be emphasized which is rooted in attitudinal values. Under universal phenomenon negative
attitudes, characters and behaviours are condemned in the home, school and religious houses.
These are expected to be the concern of moral education in schools. Values like honesty, loyalty,

40
patriotism, faithfulness, obedience, respect, truthfulness, love, unity, cooperation and so on need
to be properly taught and stressed in the school.

In the contrary, pupils need to be taught to abstain in totality from prostitution, raping,
homosexual, lesbianism, stealing, hatred, wickedness, corruption, drug addiction, alcoholism,
smoking and so forth. The aforementioned aspect of morality need to constitute crucial aspect of
body of knowledge to be taught at the primary, secondary and tertiary levels in all courses. This
arrangement will bring together values that are by nature abstract, general and actions that are by
nature concrete and specific. Indeed moral values have no meaning or relevance except in terms
of real life. It is after all through actual conduct that moral character is developed.

Heteronomy lays down general principles of conduct to be applied deductively. It is only through
experience of real and relevant situations that children can leave their application. The inductive
process is of greater value, for it starts with experience and from analysis of specific moral
actions builds up general principles. Both processes are involved in the child‘s moral education,
each can reinforce the other. The sources of such moral situations are many and varied, ranging
far beyond real life and actual experiences. Folklores and legend, fable and proverb, parable and
allegory, drama and role playing, film and films-strip, newspaper and magazine, television and
advertising all may be used as vehicles for moral learning. Their purpose is to bring to life a
moral situation to provoke discussion in terms of motives, attitudes and values, and ultimately to
lead to decision.

The aim of all such moral education is not simply to enlarge moral knowledge. Certainly it seeks
to provide practical experience of situation through which children may learn the basic principles
and values involved in living together. It is also concerned with insight, imagination,
understanding, emotion and with reasoning. Such experience, moreover, involves the shaping of
attitudes and the development of moral skills. It is not the reason alone that motivates action.
Moral concepts involve both reason and emotion and moral attitudes are the expression of the
self. The heart of morality is care and concern for others and hence the basic theme of all moral
education is self, others and the relationship between self and others.

41
8.2 The Home and Moral Values
The greatest influence upon the child‘s moral development is the home. It is not simply that the
child spends far more of his life at home, school or with friends; the child identifies mostly and
has long lasting relationships with the home. The child receives the greatest and most influential
part of the heteronomy that will shape his moral development at home. Such direct moral
education will be both systematic and episodic. Some will form a continuous and deliberate
process of upbringing, some will be on-the-spot injunctions do and don‘ts. The broad but vital
different between physical and psychological discipline imposed by parents resulting
respectively in an external or internal moral code. But far more powerful than direct and explicit
moral guidance are the unspoken assumptions in the home. In the home concepts are formed and
not the concept of persons alone.

The psychological atmosphere of the home compounded with personal relationships within it,
shape attitude towards others. The prevailing moral values, reflecting the social economic
background of the home will be absorbed. It is the family that sharpens personality, influences
emotional development and pattern of moral concepts. It socializes the child, transmitting adult
role behaviour patterns that the child first re-enacts in play and then ultimately reproduces in
himself. In practical, sex roles are learnt, a big boy does not cry, a growing girl does not fight are
examples. All these moral learning are within the context of the family pattern. The typical
nuclear family of the middle classes may develop a more reasoned morality, but it may also
bring its own strains through the intensity of limited personal relationships, above all between
mother and child.

The large family or even extended family, more typical of the working classes may impose a
more physical discipline, but provide broader experience. The home serves as the bedrock for all
round development of a child but more importantly the cultural values of the larger society is
transmitted to the child. The child is also made to know the norms of the society and at the same
time the sanctions that accompany violators. In the home a child is expected to be taught some
deviant behaviour in the society like armed rubbery, drug addiction, alcoholism, examination
malpractices, cultism, raping and so forth. This will instill moral discipline to the child when he
gets acquainted with those concepts in the school and larger society. The punishment and
punitive measures against those unacceptable behaviours need to be learnt by the child to enable
him desist.

42
8.3 The School and Moral Values
In comprising the immense moral influence of the home with the school, the school may seem
weak in the transmission of moral values to the child. It has far less opportunities to influence the
child in terms of time, population approach and responsibilities. The values it seeks to transmit
may be contradicted by those of the home. Moreover, teachers with a broad middle class
background may be seeking to instill a moral code alien to working class children. But the school
can provide under social experience of adult roles for children from the limited nuclear family
and opportunity for fuller development of individual personality to children from large families.
Explicit moral education may be both systematic and episodic in the school too. In the school
assembly, there is frequent assertion of moral values within the context of actual situations
arising from school life.

In the classroom there are frequent on-the-spot injunctions to individuals. The place of such
heteronomy in the school is clearly evidenced from our responses, sited earlier. Its value lies in
the fact that it is given within concrete situations, not in abstract and remote principles. But the
growing gulf that we find in our responses between children and teachers may well be attributed
to a heteronomy that remains authoritarian rather than aimed at developing progressive
autonomy. It suggests the value of a direct normal education based broadly on discussion that
makes reason for the moral arbiter rather than the teacher. Indirectly, the individual teacher must
have immense moral influence like the parent; he cannot help but serve as a model and example.

Where identification is made with an admired teacher, it can be a powerful influence for good.
But all his pupils are influenced by his attitude to individuals, by the system of justice that he
imposes in the classroom, whether reasoned purely heteronymous or simply impulsive by his
fairness or unfairness displayed towards members of the class, by the integrity or indifference of
his teaching and above all by the relationship between his profession and his practice. It is
moreover willnigh impossible for a teacher not to indirectly betray his own values at the same
time or another in whatever subject he teaches. His presentations too cannot but reveal whether
consciously or unconsciously his goal, authoritarian acceptance of his teaching or personal and
reasoned autonomy. Indirectly the school cannot exert strong moral influence because each
school has its own ethos or atmosphere. It is formed by relationship with the school community,
the head teacher playing an inevitably leading part. Relationships among the staff between staff

43
and pupils and among pupils themselves are all involved for morality is compounded of such
personal relationships.

Any amount of moral exhortation, whether in the context of school worship or elsewhere, will be
of little avail if the moral ethos of the school contradict it. Part of the indirect influence will be
the system of school discipline. The broad distinction is between a sacred body of objective,
unchangeable rules, with categorical penalties for any infringement and a reasoned code, seen to
be reasonable, that takes account of persons, motives, relationships and personalities. It is the
latter that is in keeping with the goal of personal autonomy or internal morality. The former has
by now familiar defects of encouraging an external morality of subservience, hypocrisy and
deceit. Where its sanction is physical punishment, there are two further defects. Not only does
such punishment mean nothing, there is no moral learning in terms of developing conscience. It
also develops the morally crude concept of expiration. The crime having been paid for in pain,
the slate is not clean. No guilt feelings are involved not will they be involved should the offence
be repeated. Yet, as we have amply seen it is such guilt feelings that are essential if the child is to
develop self control and an autonomous conscience against immorality.

CONCLUSION
The meaning of moral values was discussed with education and moral values, the home and
moral values and school and moral values were all examined. Moral values were seen as the
exhibition of acceptable cherished and appreciated values to be transmitted in every child in
order to maintain a peaceful society. The home was also seen as the bedrock of moral values
since it is the first contact of every child. The home is regarded as the foundation to develop an
acceptable human in the society. The schools collaborate and support the values that have been
transmitted from the home through practical demonstration by good virtues by the teacher.

The conclusion of this unit is based on the following:

1. Education and Moral Values: Education and Moral Values are limitlessly linked together. The
home, school and religious houses are expected to be sources of moral education to every
child in the society. The societal values like honesty, patriotism, loyalty, truthfulness, love,
sharing and so on are to be taught by parents, teachers and religious leaders to change the
attitudes of the learners in order to have a stable society. Moral values are moral exhibitions

44
 that are acceptable, cherished and appreciated in any given society for her growth and
development.

2. Home and Moral Values: Home is the greatest influence upon the child moral development. In
the home the prevailing moral values are taught and absorbed by the children for the
exhibition of acceptable behaviour in the larger society.

3. School and Moral Values: The school has it as part of her responsibilities to transmit moral
values based on the home ideas. Indirectly, the teacher serves as a source of moral values
through the demonstration of positive virtues for children to emulate.

45
 UNIT/WEEK 9:
SOCIAL FUNCTIONS OF EDUCATION
9. Introduction
This unit exposes you to social functions of education covering economic functions, political
functions, stability and change, education and cultural change. The unit stands to acquaint you
with the basic knowledge on the relationship between politics, economy and culture.

9.1 Social Functions of Education

It may be found that the way in which education is organized is not meeting the aims assigned to
it. The sociological term used to describe this state, is dysfunction and comes by analogy from
the field of medicine. Just as illness brings dysfunction to the body, so there may be dysfunction
in the social system. Furthermore, this element of dysfunction may be either latent or manifest.
When we look for the functions of any social institution, we tend to focus on the way in which
their institution helps in the rest of the social system at one moment. The picture is static, but we
know that society is in flux. Institution once established begins to have lives and to create values
of their own.
In consequence we must remember that we are examining a system prone to change. Equilibrium
is rare, tensions are common. Often there is a balance between the consequences of
contemporary social organization. In some ways it is functional and in others it is dysfunctional
where, however, there is no balance, a political decision may be necessary to rearrange the
institution so as to meet the nation‘s present aims. It is convenient to consider the social function
of education under five headings.
1. The transmission of the culture of the society, here the need is basically the conservative
way of passing on the main pattern of society through schools.
2. The provision of innovations, someone must initiate the social change that is necessary for a
society to survive under modern conditions such change may be, for example, technical,
political or artistic.
3. The political function, this may be looked at in two ways. There is first, the need to provide
political leaders at all levels of democratic society and second, there is the demand that
education should help to preserve the present system of government by ensuring loyalty to
it.

46
 4. The function of social selection, the educational system is central to the process by which
the more able are sorted out of the population as a whole.
5. The economic function, here the need is that all levels or the labour force should be provided
with the quantity and quality of educated manpower required under the current technical
condition.
There are many functions itemized above but only the economic and political aspects shall be
elaborately addressed in this work because of the intimate link between them.

9.2 Economic Function of Education

It is pertinent to examine in some detail the way in which the educational system helps to
maintain the economy. The economic function of the educational system is to provide the labour
force with the manpower that matches the need of the economy and to give future consumers the
knowledge that we require. In economic function, the education system had to observe both
quantitative and qualitative criteria. School inculcates ideals that can help or hinder the economy,
but the curriculum best suited to the rapidly autonomous developments rather than to policy
decisions. It is none the less true that if dysfunctional, these tensions must be discovered so that
they may be resolved in the light of what the country wants as its educational aim.

It is apparent that there may be conflict between the ideals needed for a smoothly working
economy and those inculcated by the ethos in the schools. A laisser-faire economy requires on
the production side, a positive attitude towards money making and ―getting on‖ and on the
assumption side, there must be an eagerness to ―keep up with the Joneses‖. These attitudes have
not been greatly favoured by teachers, due to autonomous developments rather than to policy
decisions. It is fitting to end the functional analysis of the educational system contained in this
part, by emphasizing that political decisions in pursuit of aim involving one function that
education can serve may lead to dysfunction in another sphere. This may happen tortuously if
there was insufficient thought before the political decision was taken. The main political aim was
the provision of equality of educational opportunity and the stress was laid on the function of
selection.

Understanding this, help the economy by developing capability, but very little thought has never
been given to the way that the quality of the lower levels of the labour force will be altered. Yet
in the economic, function the educational system is responsible for the schooling of all levels of

47
the labour force. Functional analysis of social institutions carried out in an unbiased way as
possible can bring such conflicts to light. This can be done for social institutions in their existing
forms, but it can also precede political decisions to older institution. This should help to prevent
the creation of social institution that is structured to increase conflict. Such an analysis will also
show where conflict may emerge and thereby force a clear decision on political priorities. The
functions of education are complex and closely interrelated. To change the educational system
sets off a restructuring of these relationships. The tools needed for the functional analysis of the
educational system have been provided to give a clearer picture of the problem involved in such
political decision as the reorganization of the secondary school system..

9.3 The Political Function of Education

The political function of educational system has two tasks. If the political unit as it is now
constituted is to survive, there is a need that all its members especially the new generation
coming to the age when it can exercise political power, shall be loyal to the assumptions
underlying the present system of government. This consensus is often taken for granted but one
of its main services whether consciously pursued or not, lay within the educational system,
secondly there is the necessity that the country shall be led. Whatever is the type of government
that exists in the country, its leaders must come from within it if it is to remain independent. The
schools can play a major role in both the selection and the training of leaders.

Mention must be made of the counterparts of these National leaders at local government level,
namely councilors and chairmen as well as the full time officers such as the director of
education, who carry out the policy determined by our democratically elected representative on
the local councils. It will be noticed that economic leaders have not been mentioned but they are
part of political leaders. At every level of leadership intelligence seems necessary. Any
educational system that selects by intelligence whether between schools or within them will
influence the supply of leaders. Entry to the grammar school is largely determined by measured
intelligence and therefore these schools are bound to be the main source of leaders for many of
the higher positions of leadership in government, industry and other spheres.

As long as we have a selective system of secondary schools, it must be arranged to find the
maximum number of intelligent children who may become leaders. But leaders are also required
in the lower rank of the society. In modern secondary schools a number of children usually of

48
working class origins, who left school at the minimum school leaving age, did have the
experience for what it was worth of filling positions of leadership whether as prefects or as
officers of school clubs. However, it would seem that in the comprehensive school such
opportunities may now be rare, since in a recent study of one comprehensive school just under
80% of the prefects come from middle class homes. Therefore attention to the education of
leaders is needed in all not merely selective schools. The prefect system was supposedly an agent
in training leaders.

Originally, as we have analyzed, it rested on domination by force but in its present less
authoritarian form it can have a placed in educating leaders. Children who are prefects have the
chance to lead others in all the activities in a school. If many activities in any school could be
systematically divided and children given the chance to lead in each sphere, far more children
than under the unitary prefect system would have the chance of acting as leaders. This
experience would be valuable only if the lessons learnt in the particular situation at school could
be transferred to situations on leaving school. Transfer depends upon conscious thought.
Therefore the vital lesson in all school leadership situations must be pointed out to the children,
namely that the dependence of the led is common to the role of all leaders. Obviously, the
educational system has two important pasts to play from a political point of view. It must ensure
that the political leaders at each level are followed even by those in loyal opposition. Democracy
is a system of government that demands a fair standard of education to ensure its continuance.
Secondly, the educational system must be organized so that those with the intelligence necessary
to lead at whatever level or in whatever sphere of the society can have the chance to do so. There
are basically the selective functions of education to which we now rely.

CONCLUSION
Based on the discussions in Unit eleven, the following conclusions were drawn. Education like
other social institutions performs quite a number of functions namely; transmission of the culture
of the society, provision of innovative ideas, laying of solid democratic foundations, aids social
mobility and provides manpower needs for its society. Basically, education assists in ignorance
eradication and human emancipation to be able to contribute meaningfully towards the growth
and development of the society.

49
 UNIT/WEEK 10:
EDUCATION AND CULTURAL CHANGE

10.1 Education and Cultural Change

The educational system may however be given a much positive role in transmitting culture. A
political decision may be taken that the existing way of life ought not to continue and the
government may want to use social institution which is as central to this purpose of educational
system in an attempt to changed the culture. One of the clearest examples of an attempt to alter
culture of a country was that made in Nigeria by Obasanjo administration after they came to
power in 1999 through the educational reforms of the National Policy from 6-3-3-4 to 9-3-4
system. They used the existing schools to create Universal Basic Education and created new ones
through National Open University System.

The government intends using the apprenticeship and training system at Junior Secondary School
level for self reliance as part of the educational system in Nigeria. Though this attempt failed in
the past due to wrong implementation, inadequate funding and shortage of manpower to handle
the practical aspect of the introductory technology. It is not that the government‘s effort to
professionally equip the students was morally wrong but the existing environment was not in
agreement with the policy couple with debased position teachers occupy within the economic
system. We as individuals in the Nigerian society must change and the schools must play a big
part in this policy.

To put it bluntly, the child must be encouraged to participate in technical education to stop
depending on government job. It is a worthwhile exercise for any teacher to examine his role and
see whether he is neutral or positive in the way in which he passes on his country‘s culture. The
child stands between two powerful influences, the school and the family. Every teacher needs to
remind himself constantly that the family is often the stronger of the two influences, especially
when the child is young. Yet paradoxically teachers of children in primary schools probably have
more direct influence on their pupils than teacher at any later stage, more particularly because of
the greater influence of the peer group amongst children of the secondary age. But at all stages
the influence of the school and later the university or college is great especially in the
introduction of ideas to older pupils.

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An inspiring teacher can create what Crowther Report has called ―Intellectual discipleship‖. The
great French sociologist Durkheim spoke of the teacher as the interpreter of the great moral ideas
of his time and his country. It is clear that these ideas may be Marxist but the teacher in his role
as teacher will pass them on to the next generation. Having known that culture is dynamic and
not static it is subject to a change at any point in time through the teacher, pupils and instrument
for delivering pedagogy in the school system.

10.2 Education as a Means of Human Liberation

Most recent and contemporary studies in education contend that education is a tool of human
liberation from the clutches of ignorance and perpetual mediocrity. Dewey (1961) asserted that
education should concern itself with the equalization of opportunities for individuals in the
community to develop himself as a person. Education is the child‘s chief means by which those
personal capabilities are to be discovered and liberated. To him education should enable human
beings to achieve their maximum distinctive growth in harmony with their fellows. In essence,
education in Nigeria these days is a catalyst capable of quickening the impetus of social change,
as it includes order to bring it nearer to the perfection of our nature. Therefore, because of its
intuitive importance, its feasibility and also its accessibility to calculation of formal education
has become one of the most studied aspects of social and economic development.

Anderson and Bowman (1965) observed that the available literature has treated education as
external to the process of social change in developing countries like Nigeria. As a relatively
independent component of development which can be organized to provide the levels of training
and the values required by the model of political and economic development that is being
utilized. However, the reality of the situation is that formal education as a complement to
informal one is itself a social product whose form is determined by the sequence of social change
now occurring in Nigeria. Contemporary education concedes that education aims at integrating
the social as well as the economic strategies people are experiencing as a result of social change
permeating the whole human societies. But the question that arises is what social change is? For
man is considered as the self builder of his group‘s structures, the self domesticator and the
creator of his own technologies, contracts most sharply with all other animals in this capacity to
modify his patterns of life through mutual efforts.

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Change is a permanent feature of man‘s social life. This is perhaps the most passive and
universal of all possible generalization regarding society. In Nigeria, because of the urge to move
away from being underdeveloped, the country thought it wise to increase its manpower, which is
skilled manpower production. The modality included free education, first at the basic level to all
its citizens which include junior secondary schools and public higher institutions all for the sake
of changing the society into an educated one. At this point however, it is pertinent to visualize
the role of education as a catalyst in ensuring and quickening the process of human liberation.
Therefore attention shall be focused on those that have bearing on contemporary Nigerian
society, relatively from independence up to date.

Education has assisted in economic and technological advancement, agricultural and

urbanization development and social mobility taking the theory of Enbourgeoisement as an
aspect under mobility. In this age of transition, education in Nigeria aims at bringing cultural
stability and integration. Hence it has been an instrument for the synthesis of the existing culture
and for the harmonious blending together of the old and new complying that culture should be
the context of education. Products of education in enhancing socio-cultural change in Nigeria
stems in its inculcation and or enhancement and improvement of our way of life, improvement
and modernization of our indigenous institution and their integration into the framework of the
new social order.

For example, the training of education of our local farmers who constitute the majority of people
who grow our cash and food crops, has led to change in technology, with increase in our
productivity and quality, thereby increasing our National product, thus creating a way for human
liberation in the way of living of majority of Nigerians. However, education has always been
identified as the art of training a person intellectually, morally, socially, politically, economically
and physical and the rest legacy any responsible parent can leave for his children to make them
self reliant after their departure from this world. In fact sky is the limit for educated persons in a
society that creates the room for social mobility. Spata, an ancient Greek philosopher stated and
demonstrated what Nigerians are clamoring for today. Both boys and girls were fully prepared
for the improvement and the stability of the State.

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CONCLUSION

In this unit, the relationship between stability and change, education and cultural change and
education as a means of human liberation were discussed. The unit explained that social change
and innovation lead to the problem of stability. The function of bringing or providing innovation
clashes with that of transmitting culture. Any time there is a change; there is a friction or
resistance, which invariably impairs stability. In case there is any reform in the education
industry there is usually pandemonium, which affects stability. In the political realm, education
stands as avenue to effect cultural change. Even the classroom, school uniform changes and
curriculum innovation are sources of cultural change. All over the world human liberation is
done through the provision of equal educational opportunities to the citizenry. This is done
through the provision of free education for skilled manpower production.

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 UNIT/WEEK 11:
THE SOCIOLOGY OF TEACHING

11.1 The Role of a Teacher

To the general public, teachers probably seem conformists and isolated from the real world, but
there is reason to believe that the role of the teacher is changing and that teachers are now seen
as ordinary people who teach rather than as cultured paragons. Teachers see themselves in
various ways. Two common self images are the academic and the child centered types, neither of
which seems to meet the needs of the schools in contemporary Nigeria society.

In one respect the teacher is in a unique social position he has been formed by the social system
to which he returns to from others. He can very easily transmit the values that he has picked up
himself as he passed through the educational system. Any role covers the set of values and
expectation of a particular position in a social system from the point of view of both the occupant
of the position and those with whom he interacts. Implicit in the idea of a role, therefore, is a
selfimage and a public image. The role of the teacher is organized around the functions that he
fulfills to be more specific, in the main time it centres on the transmission of that knowledge and
those values that are defined as the curriculum of the particular school in which he is teaching. In
different parts of the educational system the weight given to these and to other functions will
vary, for this reason the role of the teacher in the infant school will not be the same as that of the
secondary and university.

At the infant or primary schools, teachers are expected to be concerned mostly with the children
they teach and not the curriculum. At that level teaching has to be centered round the learner‘s
personality development as well as the body of knowledge to be imparted. This is because the
child is just transiting from the home to the school. At the secondary school level, special
attention has to be accorded the child‘s future career because at this level a wider scope of the
body of knowledge is taught with deeper sense of responsibility because of the manifestation of
character traits at this stage. The emotional and psychological traumas in operation amongst the
learners at this stage require special attention to better channel the future of these children. At the
tertiary level a teacher is saddled with enormous responsibility of teaching, researching and
community development participation which deserve more commitment, dedication and display
of academic prowess, ability and capability.

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Most people have in their minds a number of imaginary pictures that cover what they consider to
be salient features of any occupational role. If teachers are called to mind, several stereotypes
exist. There is, for example, the stern and magnified teacher and there is the gentle and self
effacing teacher. Much of other social intercourse is determined by the stereotype of the
occupation with which we are at the moment in contact. When we meet our doctor or a
clergyman in the street, the stereotype that we have of these occupations govern our behaviour
towards that particular doctor or clergyman. Parents are often heard to say of the child‘s teacher,
He‘s a typical teacher, or she‘s not at all like a teacher, and they will adjust their behaviours to
this teacher according to the way in which he differs from their stereotype.

The most usual stereotype of the Nigerian teacher was centered around these points. The first and
most important is the relationship between teacher and child, the teacher is expected to show no
favoritism and to be interested in helping the child and also show love towards his pupils. The
second focus is the manner in which students are taught. It is expected to stress things,
particularly of a verbal nature to observe the children and to give them tasks to do. Finally,
control was important and is seen in terms of order and quietness. The public consider the
relationships between the teacher and children to be much more important than the two points.
This emphasis on the emotional support of the child at the expense of his instruction is probably
one of the main differences between the role of teachers who are well trained and those without
proper training.

Teachers are expected to reflect the general moral values of the community in their behaviour
and to set a good example by the high standard of conduct. They are expected to avoid all the
interesting sins of our age. If he sins at all, it should be by the omission. Teachers should be seen
as conformists and as rather neutral persons who do nothing out of the ordinary. The teacher has
often been called ―a social stranger‖ This is almost inevitable because of his position. Firstly, the
teacher spends much of his life amongst children; to parents he is nearly always known only in
connection with their children. His life is built around those things usually associated with
childhood, such as games, examinations and school rituals. In this respect, the teacher is in many
ways cut-off from the world of adult. But he his also bound to be remote from children because
he must keep discipline in his close and usually has at his command a whole arsenal of rewards
and punishments. Secondly, the teacher is often culturally unique apart from the community that
he serves. If he lives in it, he is not in it, and if he travels daily to school from distance,

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geographical as well as cultural separation exists. The cultural aspect is important since it
indicates that the role of the teacher is a mediating role, it acts as a bridge linking present and
future. The clergyman link sacred and secular, the psychiatrist, sick and well and the teacher
teach and learn.

11.2 The Reluctant Learner

The attitude and behaviour of children towards the class teacher and towards authority in general
and classroom learning situations depends on the learner‘s perception of himself and his
relationship with others. It is a mother of social attitudes in relation to other pupils or to their
participation in some programmes under way. It is in dynamics of situations of some sorts that
the social identity of the child is revealed and the nature of the stigma of spoiled identity
becomes more clearly delineated. Teachers have always been particularly prone to the use of
stigma terms such as ―moron‖ dullard‖ ―blithering idiot‖, indecorous nonentity ―and so on in a
colourful metaphorical and sometimes gently jocose sort of way. These derogatory assertions are
at times followed by severe beating and brutality. These create lack of interest in the child as he
manifests some reluctance towards learning bringing about an incapable of normal behaviour.

The child who has been repeatedly told that she is ―just stupid‖ will grasp the stigma and make it
literally her own and often in some strangely perverted way, she may feel that there is something,
special about her which does not demand the conformity required by other children. There are
also other factors that influence a child‘s behaviour in school situation. These factors are both in
school and out of it and we should wary about asserting too much about the causes of a child‘s
behaviour in the school. Teachers know from experience that the home background of the child
greatly influences his behaviour in the classroom and speculate accurately or inaccurately about
the family from simply observation of the child in school. A child who shows some reluctance
towards learning and school is definitely a deviant.

The usage of this term by sociologist does not reflect condemnation, but merely refers to all
those whose behaviour falls outside the tolerated range along whatever dimension is being
considered. Thus a boy maybe normal in respect of his familiar roles and be seen as a good son
but may be a deviant at school and therefore seen as a reluctant learner. It is also important that
we look at the concept reluctance or deviance from the structural perspective, a society maybe
organized in a way that some individuals follow pathways that could lead to deviance and from

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the interpersonal perspective, some children and indeed adults may be socialized in just the way
analyzed above into deviant roles.

11.3 Teacher in the Classroom

A major part of the school day for any teacher or pupil is spent teaching and learning that part of
the curriculum that is taught in the classroom. The school or classroom is a group that consists of
a teacher and varying number of children like any other social system. Class can be divided into
constituent parts in order to see what function each part is playing in the whole. It should also be
possible to see how the various parts interact with each other in fulfilling their functions. There is
the school class as a social system, the technique and sociometric, that has been devised to study
the interrelationships within such small groups as the school class. The school class as a social
system carried out quite a number of functions in the educational system.

The school class assists the family in developing the intellect and personality of the growing
child and it helps to allocate the child when he has grown up to the most fitting niche in adult
society. The school class is a social system in itself that performs certain definite additional
functions. The teacher is not merely manipulating the children by providing leadership. But by
his very presence he affects the currents of feeling that flow between the members of the group
and between the group and himself. To the children in the school class the teacher is superior
adult who is not a member of their families. Before going to school the relationships of most
children with adults have been of an expensive nature.

The family has cared about happiness and other emotional requirements which are now
transferred to the classroom to shoulder under the teacher. The children must learn his ways and
the teacher must discover the characteristics manner of each child. Each must test the other to
learn the limits of behaviors, but this conflict serves as useful function in that it leads not to a
position of equilibrium, but to a point where tension is reduced to a minimum for this group.
When this is achieved, teacher and children know what to expect from each other and the class as
a whole can fulfill this functions as efficiently as possible. So far we have analyzed what the
functions of the teacher and the school class are but have not tried to see what at the exact
interrelations within the class itself. If the teacher wishes to see the class objectively as it is and
not subjectively as he thinks. This he can achieve using sociometric techniques. This is a

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particular way of measuring social behaviour that leads to the study of the structure and
development of groups.

Sociometric tests can be plotted as socio-gram that displays in schematic form the relationship
within group. Groups of three persons who choose each other will be represented as a triangle
with its apexes joined by lines. Mutual friends who choose each other can easily be seen. A
popular figure that is the choice of many will appear in the sociogram as the centre of a star,
whilst those who are not chosen at all will be seen as isolates. Such a diagram will reveal to the
teacher the social forces at work in his classroom at a moment of time in respect of a particular
activity about which he has asked the children. If he wishes to observe whether change is taking
place, he can repeat the test after say, three months. One of the problems that sociograms can
pose is what to do about isolates. To place the child in an existing group may make this child
withdraw even further. To put a number of isolates together in one group may prove even worse,
as the qualities that make them compatible to the rest of the class may well make them
unacceptable to each other. If teachers are not careful, the isolates may feel rejected by the
teacher and his classmates.

CONCLUSION
In this unit, under sociology of teaching, the role of teachers, the reluctant learner and teacher in
the classroom were discussed. Teachers are expected to be custodian of skill and knowledge and
character reformation through cordial relationship with the learners in the classroom in order to
create awareness and interest in them. In the same vein, the reluctant leaner are members of the
classroom who need to be encouraged to participate actively in class activities. Teachers in the
classroom are expected to be accommodating, persevering and friendly with their pupils in order
for them to have sense of belonging. Teachers are also encouraged to be non-partial in the
selection of leaders in the classroom and in the award of rewards, punishment and marks during
examination.

In this unit the following conclusion were drawn.

1. The roles of teachers: The roles of teachers are becoming a changing one considering the
high level of social change in the field of education in all ramifications. The unique social
position teachers occupy within the social system through the educational system makes it a
necessity to examine teachers‘ roles. The most crucial aspects of teachers‘ role are the

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 transmission of skills and knowledge based on the curriculum. Teachers are also expected to
represent the parents in the school by attending to emotional and psychological traumas of
the learners to make them stable and collected.
2. The reluctant learners who probably have negative attitudes towards learning need to be
friendlier with to alleviate their negative interaction. It is also pertinent to discourage the
usage of words of condemnation rather positive statements to motivate them to learn are
expected to be used on them for normal behaviour.
3. Teachers in the classroom are not only to teach and make pupils to learn the body of
knowledge in the curriculum but to encourage healthy interpersonal relationship through the
employment of sociogram on the choice of leaders.

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