A system of interconnected part each with a unique function. The parts have to work together for stability and balance of society

1. SOCIAL SCIENCE THEORIES AND
THEIR IMPLICATIONS TO
EDUCATION

4. SOCIAL SCIENCE THEORY
a systematic explanation for the
observed facts and laws that
relate to a specific aspect oflife.

5. •Herbert Spencer
•A system of interconnected part each with a unique
function. The parts have to work together for stability
and balance of society".
•The functionalist theory of education focuses on how
education serves the need of society through the
development of skills encouraging social cohesion.

6. •Focused on social stability and
solidarity.
•See Education as a beneficial
contribution to an ordered society.

7. •Intellectual Purposes - acquisition of cognitive and
inquiry skills.
•Political Purposes - educate future citizen; promote
patriotism; promote assimilation of immigrants;
ensure order, public civility and conformity to laws.
•Economic Purposes - prepare students to later work
roles; select and train the labor force needed by
society.

8. •Social Purposes - promote a sense of social
and moral responsibility; serve as a site for
the solution or resolution of social problems;
supplement the efforts of other institutions
of socialization such as the family and the
church.

9. •According to this theory, there are always
two opposing sides in a conflicts situation.
People take sides between maintaining the
status quo and Introducing change then
arrive at an agreement.
• Conflict theory welcomes conflict for that
is the way to the establishment of a new
society.

10. • There are always two opposing sides in a
conflict situation.
•Conflict theory welcomes conflict for that is
the way to the establishment of a new
society.
• Conflict theorists find potential conflict
between any groups where inequality exists;
racial, gender, religious, political, economic,
and so on.

11. Conflict theory looks at society as a
competition for limited resources. This
perspective is a macro-level approach most
identified with the writings of German
philosopher and sociologist Karl Marx (1818-
1883), who saw society as being made up of two
classes, the bourgeoisie (capitalist) and the
proletariat (workers), who must compete for
social, material, and political resources such as
food and housing, employment, education, and

12. Social institutions like government,
education, and religion reflect this
competition in their inherent inequalities
and help maintain the unequal social
structure. In the economic sphere, Marx
focused on the mode of production" (e.g..
the industrial factory) and (relations of
production" (e.g.. unequal power between
workers and factory owners).

13. •According to the conflict theory, education is not
truly a social benefit or opportunity as seen by the
functionalists. Rather, education is a powerful means
of maintaining power structures and creating a docile
work force for capitalism.
•The purpose of education is to maintain social
inequality and to preserve the power of those who
dominate society and teach those in the working class
to accept their positon as a lower class worker of
society.

14. •George H. Mead/Max Weber.
•Three tenets of symbolic interactionist theory.
•An individuals action depends on meaning -
We act based on the meaning we give to
symbols. Symbols can be actions, objects or
words.

15. •Different people may give
different meanings to the same
thing.
•Meanings change as individuals
interact with one another.

16. •Symbolic interactionism directs sociologists
to consider the symbols and details of
everyday life, what these symbols mean and
how they interact with one another.
•People attach meanings to symbols, and
then they act according to their subjective
interpretation of these symbols.

17. •Critics claims that symbolic
interactionism neglects the macro level of
social interpretation-the "big-picture." In
other words, symbolic interactionists may
miss the larger issues of society by
focusing too closely on the "trees" or by
restricting themselves to small or
individual interactions.