«Farcela a scuola non è un gioco da bambini»: bambini e bambine e la riuscita scolastica

What happens to children that invest a great deal in school learning? Not all of them are successful. Are the results tied only to social origins? The article investigates, through an exploratory qualitative study, perceptions of school of 38 ten-year-old children (females and males, attending schools located in a middle-to-upper-class and in a working-class area). The perspective we have adopted belongs to the recent childhood sociology, based on the hypothesis of children considered as social actors. The research, carried out in Turin, (has utilised in-depth interviews, as well as some elements of ethnographic observation) directed at children attending the last year of elementary school, compared with interviews with some their parents and teachers. Three patterns of investments have been identified, different for learning modalities and families’ educational styles.School results are also different for each pattern