Section 1- Promoting & preventing poverty

Step 1: Steps to alleviate poverty in schools you can take as a teacher-

Steps you can take as an educator to catch them up to the academic progress of kids with a higher SES
level
TCH 212 TEXTBOOK- Most parents of poor children work, but they dont earn enough to provide
their families with basic necessitiesadequate food, shelter, child care, and health care. When
children are poor, they are more likely to drop out of school and be involved in violent crime,
early sexual activity, and drugs. Children, with little voice and no votes, are among the first to
lose services. Approximately 6 million children under age 18 have no medical coverage. In short,
poverty puts children at risk.- (118-119)
o As a teacher you need to avoid soft bias. This means that you lower your academic
expectations for children in poverty, expecting less of them because of their socio-
economic level. Essentially, keep your academic goals and expectations high for children
of poverty. (120)
o In the study, students were randomly chosen and the teachers told these students
would experience an intellectual growth spurt during the year. Lo and behold, over the
year, their grades improved. Teacher expectations of improved performance led to
improved performance.-58
This was a study conducted by Rosenthal and Jacobson. It was designed to test
idea of the expectation theory- that teachers who teach their children
differently because of their economic or racial background do poorly in school.
It proved that high teacher expectations cause students to have high
achievement, and the if they had low expectations that the students would have
low achievement
Teachers who are influenced by soft bias and expectation theory exhibit the
following behaviors to their students: fewer chances to respond, less praise,
give their students work that is not as academically challenging, and do not
exhibit non-verbal signs like eye contact and smiling at the student (144).
Intelligence testing often overlooks many students who are gifted. Students living in poverty,
particularly those whose parents are uneducated or speak English as a second language are less
likely to develop the verbal skills measured by these traditional intelligence tests.- 37
o One way to improve this is to help students develop the necessary vocabulary. Working
to do so will reduce the language deficit between them and students with higher SES
backgrounds
o Also helps children overcome the isolation of the poor neighborhoods in which they live
because it can help the child take on a broader perspective
o Another thing teachers can do is get students wither lower SES backgrounds involved in
extracurricular activities. It has the bonuses of keeping the students in a safer
environment, it help them create relationships with their peers, and gives them the
chance to expose themselves to various athletic, cultural, and artistic activities. (120)
APA Source-
Teachers, schools, and society by David Miller Sadker and Karen R. Zittleman
(Sadker & Zittleman, 10
th
edition)