Why Does Family Wealth Affect Learning?

Hey everybody!
I just read the article, Why Does Family Wealth Affect Learning? There were a few terms I thought we all should know.
Human capitol-the skills or knowledge of individuals, usually bases on their education and experience.
Socioeconomic(social and economic put together)- this includes measures of family income, parental education, and parental occupation.
ample-generous or more than adequate in size, scope, or capacity. 


This article is basically about what the title says, does money affect learning? This article explains ways how money can effect learning. Obviously, students who have more money have the resources to provide for more opportunities in education. While students who do not have a lot of money, do not have as many opportunities. However, this article shows from the very beginning how the poorer students are already in a bad situation compared to the richer students. The low income families do not have enough money to have access to health care. This can lead to the baby being born with low birth weight and cognitive impairment. Then, if the poor mom drinks or takes drugs while pregnant, the child is at risk for fetal syndromes. Once born, the child faces lasting impacts. These lasting impacts include poorer health and cognitive impairment. These two impacts can effect the rest of the kid's life. Then as the child grows, the child can be exposed to poor environment, horrible daycare, and then going to a poor school. Furthermore, if the child goes to a poor school, it is more likely the child will have less experienced teachers. While growing up in this environment, the child also has to deal with their families financial consequences. The family could be piled up in a small house, not have any water, or have electricity. If the child does not have electricty, how can he see to do his homework? Then it would be distracting having alot of people piled up in one house. Overall, a child being born into a poor family has a lasting impact on his life and learning. 
Even though all this is true for a poor child, what would happen if the poor child got a lot of money one day? Would it help the child academically? The answer is no because the richer child also has human and social capitol. Human capitol is where the child learns from experiences. Social capitol is where the child has connections to people with money. By the rich child having these capitols, they have a lot more opportunities. The poor child would need these capitols to fully affect his academic success. 


So the question you must be thinking is if I am a teacher, how do I handle a poor child that comes from this kind of background? Well first, you need to remember that every child is different. Therefore, each child is going to come from a different background, even all the poor kids. You, as a teacher, can show support to the child who does need help and comes from this type of background. Give the child support in the classroom by helping them understand the lesson. You could also help them after school. You could allow students stay after school and help them do their homework, since they may not be able to do it at home. It is also important to try to get the parents involved. By getting the parents involved, the child will have more support at home. Overall, you should support, be caring, and know you can make some kind of a difference in the child's life.