1- Relationships & Processes Within Schools- PROCESSES

Hidden Curriculum

★ Is the informal teaching done in schools that socialises children to societal norms.

Introduction

• Factors within schools (internal factors) that influence the student and teacher experience of education.

• The factors include subcultures, pupil identities, and organisation

Hidden curriculum

• The hidden curriculum prepares children for the adult world.

• Children learn how to deal with bureaucracy, rules, expectations, waiting for their turn, and sitting still for hours during the day.

• Schools in different cultures socialise children differently to prepare them to function well in those cultures.

School ethos

• The ethos of a school refers to specific things that make up the particular character of the school.

• For example, schools might emphasise high academic success or pupil wellbeing; they might hold specific religious values or encourage parental involvement.

Ethos/hidden curriculum

• School ethos is referred to as the ‘hidden curriculum’, which includes things such as school uniform, school rules, ability grouping and school assemblies.

The Hidden Curriculum

Examples of things student learn through the hidden curriculum are:

1. Schools have hierarchies (with teachers above students)

• Students learn to respect authority.

2. The importance of punctuality

• This prepares student to turn up to work and events on time.

3. Misbehaving incurs punishment

• This teaches students the importance of following orders.

4. To wear uniform

• Students learn the importance of dressing smartly and sticking to dress codes.

Stereotyping, Pupil Identities and the Halo Effect

Labelling and stereotyping, as well as wider teacher-pupil interactions, can influence the construction of positive and negative pupil self-concepts (pupil identities).

Stereotypes

• Stereotypes held by teachers include labels such as bright or slow learner, conformist or disruptive, hard working or lazy.

• These stereotypical impressions can result in teachers making assumptions about pupils that are often wrong.

  • For example, assuming that a 'well-behaved' pupil is also 'hardworking'.

The ‘halo effect’

• This phenomenon is known as the ‘halo effect’.

• Waterhouse (2004), carried out a case study of 4 primary and secondary schools, finding that teacher labelling of pupils as either normal/average or deviant types (as a result of impressions formed over time) has implications for the way teachers interact with pupils.

Waterhouse

• Once these labels are applied and become the dominant categories for pupils, they can become what Waterhouse terms a ‘pivotal identity’ for students.

• ★ A core identity providing a pivot that teachers then use to interpret and reinterpret classroom situations and student behaviour.

'Pivotal identities’

• These ‘pivotal identities’ can then lead to various pupil responses, including conflict, confrontations and the formation of a range of pro-social and anti-social subcultures.

→ Once a teacher labels pupils as either normal/average or deviant types, these labels become the dominant categories for pupils, and turn into what Waterhouse terms a ‘pivotal identity’ for students.

Waterhouse's study into the Halo Effect:

• Studied 4 primary and secondary schools

• Conducted in 2004

• A case study

Stereotyping of the ‘Ideal Pupil’

→ Labelling and stereotyping, as well as wider teacher-pupil interactions, can influence the construction of positive and negative pupil self-concepts (pupil identities).

Research

• Howard Becker (1971) concluded that teachers initially evaluate pupils in relation to a stereotype of the ‘ideal pupil’ (e.g. conformist, hard-working)

• Amelia Hempel-Jorgensen found that many pupils share a similar stereotype of the ‘ideal learner’.

Social class

• These stereotypes are influenced by a range of non-academic features, such as dress, behaviour, and likeability, which conform to the middle-class standards of teachers, while disadvantaging pupils from working-class homes, boys and some ethnic minority groups.

Consequences

• Such stereotypes can influence academic assessments of pupil abilities and influence teacher expectations of pupils, such as to which ability stream or set the pupil belongs.

Non-academic features that influence teacher stereotypes:

• Behaviour

• Likeability

• Dress

‘Pivotal Identity’

★ A core identity providing a pivot which teachers then use to interpret and reinterpret classroom situations and student behaviour.

Examples of lessons learned through the hidden curriculum:

• Dealing with bureaucracy

• Obeying rules

• Waiting one’s turn

• Sitting still for hours during the day

Possible pupil responses to ‘pivotal identities’ (Waterhouse, 2004):

1. Conflict and confrontations

2. The formation of a range of pro-social and anti-social subcultures