Culture, Socialisation and the Formation of Identity: Activities

Suggested teacher activities: socialisation, agencies of socialisation and the formation of identity

AQA 7192 3.2.1 Culture and Identity. Built from L15 Culture, Socialisation and the Formation of Identity.

The activities below are all built directly from the Culture, Socialisation and Formation of Identity page. Each one is labelled with the AQA assessment objective(s) (AO1, AO2 and AO3) it is designed to target, and with a short explanation of why. This is intended as a menu for teachers to select from, not a single fixed lesson plan; the suggested running order at the end offers one sensible sequence, but individual tasks can be lifted out and used on their own as a starter, homework or assessed piece.

The three assessment objectives (AQA A-level Sociology)
AO1: Demonstrate knowledge and understanding of sociological theories, concepts, evidence and methods. This means accurately defining terms and correctly naming sociologists and their studies.
AO2: Apply knowledge and understanding of sociological theories, concepts, evidence and methods to a range of issues. This means using a concept or theory correctly on a specific example, ideally one that was not simply copied from the notes.
AO3: Analyse and evaluate sociological theories, concepts, evidence and methods in order to present arguments, make judgements and draw conclusions. This means weighing competing arguments against one another and reaching a reasoned overall judgement, rather than only describing both sides.
Activity 1: Cold call retrieval on key terms and named sociologists

Using the key terms checklist at the end of the Culture, Socialisation and Formation of Identity page, run a cold call round (a questioning technique in which the teacher poses a question and then names a student to answer, rather than waiting for a volunteer to raise a hand, so that every student has to stay ready to answer at any point), using lolly sticks, a random name generator or a simple register order to select who answers next. Six possible questions are:

Thinking time matters as much as the questions themselves.

Pause for around 10-30 seconds of silent thinking time after asking each question, before naming a student to answer, rather than naming the student first. This gives every student, not only the most confident, time to retrieve the answer, and stops the task feeling like a test of who can react quickest.

Cold calling without thinking time tends to raise anxiety and reward speed over accuracy; with it, the technique remains inclusive while still holding the whole class, not just volunteers, accountable for thinking. Accept a partial answer and build on it with a second cold-called student rather than only rewarding the first correct response, and briefly restate the correct answer each time so the whole class hears it.

Assessment objectives covered
AO1: This task is almost entirely AO1. Cold calling checks that every student, not just those who volunteer, can state sociological concepts and name the correct sociologist accurately, which is the foundation the other two assessment objectives build on.
Activity 2: Blank perspectives grid

Give students a blank version of the seven-perspective table (functionalism, Marxism and neo-Marxism, feminism, the New Right, interactionism, postmodernism and late modernity) and ask them to complete the “view on socialisation and identity” and “key thinker or study” columns from memory or from notes. Once complete, students swap with a partner and check each other’s answers against the version in the Culture, Socialisation and Formation of Identity page, correcting any missing thinker or misapplied view.

Assessment objectives covered
AO1: The main demand is accurate recall of seven named perspectives and their associated thinkers, for example Parsons and Bales, Bowles and Gintis, Oakley, Murray, Cooley and Mead, Baudrillard, and Giddens and Bauman.
AO2: Completing the second, more detailed table, which applies each perspective separately to primary socialisation, secondary socialisation and the formation of identity, requires students to apply a general perspective to three distinct aspects of the topic, rather than describing the perspective only in the abstract.
Activity 3: Apply Oakley’s four processes to a new example

Ask students to choose an everyday situation not covered in the Culture, Socialisation and Formation of Identity page, such as a children’s birthday party, a toy shop layout, a school uniform policy or a greetings card aisle, and identify one clear example of each of Oakley’s (1972) four processes of gender socialisation: manipulation, canalisation, verbal appellation and differential activity exposure. Students should write one sentence per process, naming the process, describing the example precisely, and explaining briefly why it counts as that specific process rather than one of the other three.

Assessment objectives covered
AO2: This is a strong AO2 task. AO2 specifically rewards applying a named sociological concept to unfamiliar material, rather than reproducing the examples already given in the document, such as telling a boy not to cry or giving dolls to girls.
AO1: The task also draws on AO1, since each of Oakley’s four processes must first be defined correctly before it can be applied to a new example.
Activity 4: Ascribed status, achieved status and master status case study

Working in pairs, students choose a public figure other than Lance Armstrong whose reputation has been transformed by a single event, for example a disgraced politician, a fallen celebrity or a sportsperson caught cheating. Using Linton’s (1936) distinction between ascribed and achieved status, and Hughes’s (1945) concept of a master status, students identify which of the figure’s statuses were ascribed, which were achieved, and explain how one master status came to override the others in the public’s eyes.

Assessment objectives covered
AO1: Correctly defining ascribed status, achieved status and master status, and attributing them to Linton (1936) and Hughes (1945), is the AO1 element of this task.
AO2: Applying these three concepts accurately to a new, independently chosen case study, rather than restating the Lance Armstrong example from the document, is what makes this task predominantly AO2.
Activity 5: “Defend the perspective” free will debate

Put students into pairs. One student argues the functionalist position, that Parsons and Bales’s (1955) account of the family as a “personality factory” is broadly correct. The other student argues Wrong’s (1961) oversocialised conception of man critique, that people actively negotiate and sometimes resist socialisation. Each student must use at least one piece of evidence from the Culture, Socialisation and Formation of Identity page, for example Willis’s (1977) lads or the fall in Roblox’s daily user numbers, to support their assigned position. The pair then jointly decides which side is more convincing overall, and records one sentence explaining why.

Assessment objectives covered
AO3: This task targets AO3 directly. AO3 requires students to weigh arguments against one another and reach a reasoned judgement, rather than simply describing the functionalist and free will positions side by side.
Activity 6: Applying the under-16 social media ban case study

Using the extension case study on the UK’s under-16 social media ban (2026), students work in small groups to argue either that the ban is a proportionate response to a genuine agency of socialisation, using Gauntlett’s (2008) argument that media actively shapes identity, or that it is closer to Cohen’s (1972) concept of a moral panic (an exaggerated public and media reaction to a perceived social threat), drawing on the criticism from the Molly Rose Foundation cited in the document. Groups should also consider Livingstone’s (1998) active audience argument, that young people are likely to seek out alternative platforms rather than simply accept the ban.

Assessment objectives covered
AO2: Applying Gauntlett, Cohen and Livingstone’s concepts specifically to a real, current policy is the main AO2 demand of this task.
AO3: Weighing the moral panic interpretation against the genuine risk interpretation, and reaching a group judgement on which is more convincing, is the AO3 element.
Activity 7: Exam-style extended-writing question

Set the following essay question, already suggested in the Culture, Socialisation and Formation of Identity page’s check your understanding section: “Socialisation leaves people with little genuine free will.” To what extent do sociologists agree with this view? Students should be told to use Parsons and Bales (1955) or Bowles and Gintis (1976) to support the claim, and Wrong’s (1961) free will critique to challenge it, before reaching a reasoned overall judgement.

Assessment objectives covered
This single task deliberately covers all three assessment objectives at once, which mirrors how AQA marks extended sociology essays.
AO1: Demonstrated through accurate reference to named sociologists and their studies.
AO2: Demonstrated through applying their arguments specifically to the question of free will and socialisation, using real evidence such as Willis’s lads or the Roblox case study.
AO3: Demonstrated through the final weighing-up of both sides and the reasoned judgement the question explicitly asks for.
Suggested running order

A sensible sequence for a lesson or homework set is to use Activity 1 as a starter retrieval task, Activities 2 and 3 as the main teaching input and application, Activity 4 or 6 as a follow-up application task, Activity 5 as a plenary or discussion task, and Activity 7 as a formal assessed piece once the topic has been covered in full.