Blog Post 3: The Hidden Curriculum

I have always found the hidden curriculum to be an interesting topic when it comes to the many aspects of the curriculum in general, which is why I chose to look further into it. The article “Is the Hidden Curriculum a Relevant Issue in Educational Processes” by Patarroyo, Díaz, and Barreto de Quintero interested me because it talks about how the hidden curriculum can have positive or negative effects in education. They define the hidden curriculum as something that “refers to all the actions or situations developed in class unconsciously” (Díaz et al., 2004, p. 163). This is something that the students are never aware of because it includes behaviours that they learn through simply the experience of going to school. The article states that there are strategies that teachers can use to incorporate the hidden curriculum into their pedagogical strategies so that the benefits can be seen. Even though there are these problems highlighted within the hidden curriculum, it is still mentioned that it holds a lot of importance, being that it has a strong influence on student learning. This article talks about how “there are some specific social aspects highly affected by the hidden curriculum such as gender equality, social classes, racial differences and so on” (Díaz et al., 2004, p. 163). We often don’t even notice that these aspects are the products of the hidden curriculum and can affect how students approach their learning. These aspects also create problems for how students see each other, which in turn alters their behaviour towards others to be negative. The article specifically talks about how the hidden curriculum brings about ideas that complicate how students see gender differences, as seen in the example that “girls must behave better than boys” (Díaz et al., 2004, p. 164). These are typical issues that simply arise from the students just going through school without noticing what they are actually experiencing, apart from noticing the formal curriculum objectives.

With these issues arising from the hidden curriculum, the article explains some ways for the teacher to get around these. It is first necessary for the teachers to recognize when the hidden curriculum is causing negative effects on students. This will allow them to determine what actions are needed in order to guide the actions of a curriculum in a way. They must be careful how they approach this as to not be too demanding when they are addressing these things to the students. They want to instead address this in a way that is meaningful to the students and their thinking behaviours. The article recommends that in order to step away from stereotypical views of social skills, “they must make the hidden curriculum explicit to students” (Díaz et al., 2004, p. 164). This means that the students need the aspects of the hidden curriculum to be clear to them. These include observation techniques such as diaries, videos, peer modelling, and teacher modelling. This then allows the teachers to correct any negative patterns they see occurring from the hidden curriculum along the way. The other tool that they mention is the use of a portfolio, which allows students to collect all of their physical thinking and work. Through this they can see for themselves what areas they excel in and what areas may need some improving. I noticed that the observation method of approaching the hidden curriculum from a positive way has a focus on the teacher witnessing what the students are experiencing in the classroom, which doesn’t truly allow for the students to notice it. When looking at the portfolio method, I can see that this focuses on what the students notice in their behaviours from the hidden curriculum. Each method allows for the management of these issues that are considered to be of great relevance in teaching-learning processes, which results in a more efficient education.

As I move forward into examining the topic of the hidden curriculum for assignment one, there are some important next steps that I must take. I have to first find a couple more articles that tie into different aspects of the hidden curriculum. These must be readings that have a few connections with my first article, which could talk about the issues seen from a social standpoint or the things that teachers can do to allow for the hidden curriculum to have positive impacts. The readings must also differ from my first article so that I am able to broaden the overview of the hidden curriculum. This could include looking more into the positive benefits that it could have on students. Being that my first article covers the general idea of the hidden curriculum, I would need to find articles that go deeper into the impacts of both these positive and negative aspects of the hidden curriculum on the students’ lives and society. I have noticed that the hidden curriculum is something that I have not really heard about in the past, so I am wanting to do further research into the background of it and how it can be seen in the classroom. From here, I would have enough information on multiple areas of the topic in order to use all three pieces of reading to write my critical summary.

References:

Díaz, J., Patarroyo, E., & Barreto de Quintero, S. (2004). Is the Hidden Curriculum a Relevant Issue in Educational Processes. PROFILE Issues in Teachers’ Professional Development, 5(1), 162-165.