Two related aspects of hidden curriculum–or sources of hidden curriculum messages–can be distinguished: the structural or organizational and the cultural.

Played out in hallways, lunchrooms, restrooms, and other nonclassroom spaces in two urban high schools she studied, it was dominated by a hostile, alienated youth culture antagonistic to typically middle-class school and social norms. For example, Annette Hemmings investigated what she calls a 'hidden corridor curriculum' that students have to negotiate in one way or another. More recent work also has examined physical and business education and student cultures, with attention to messages about race/ethnicity, disability, and gender/sexual orientation as well as social class, politics, and culture. Nonpublic schools, in contrast, such as Quaker or elite private schools, convey different hidden curriculum messages.Įarlier studies of hidden curriculum were conducted primarily in public elementary schools with a focus on academic classrooms.

It is this conservative bias, portrayed in articles by Jean Anyon and Michael Apple, that has been targeted by critics concerned about aspects of hidden curriculum, which work against diversity, equity, and social justice. In other words, hidden curriculum usually serves to maintain the status quo, specifically the dominant culture and prevailing socioeconomic hierarchy. public schools has been cultural transmission or teaching students the routines for getting along in school and the larger society. Thus, a major purpose of the hidden curriculum of U.S. public schools, such as recent immigrants, were expected to adapt and fit in, for example, by looking at the teacher when spoken to, learning and using standard English, waiting (to speak, for the teacher's attention, for permission to use the toilet), and working hard. Such teachings became implicit, if not hidden, by the early twentieth century because they were seen to be working and could be taken for granted as natural and normal. The nineteenth-century McGuffey readers, for example, were intended to inculcate good behavior, such as passivity, punctuality, and respect for authority, through their stories, Protestant Christian prayers, and direct admonitions. Much of the organization and culture of schooling now referred to as hidden curriculum was once explicit assertive socialization according to a 1977 study by Elizabeth Vallance. When hidden and explicit curricula conflict, it may be that hidden curriculum, like nonverbal communication, carries more weight. It is likely that hidden curriculum has the most impact when there is an aggregate or a pattern of consistent messages. Prominent displays of athletic trophies in the hallway near the school's main office–but not recognition for debate or music or scholarship–communicates a hierarchy of valued accomplishments that puts sports ahead of academics. Hidden curriculum can support or undermine official curriculum. For example, while school social studies curriculum typically emphasizes and even celebrates democratic political systems and principles, such as one person-one vote, majority rule and minority rights, separation of church and state, equality before the law, and due process, these principles are not always practiced in public school classrooms and corridors. The messages of hidden curriculum may complement or contradict each other as well as the official curriculum.

Hidden curriculum in education