Language Syllabus Design and Materials Development: what is hidden curriculum

1. Hidden Curriculum
Student: Zahra Bayani
Course:
Language Syllabus Design and
Materials Development

2. Origin of the Hidden Curriculum:
Phillip Jackson (1968) highlights the term 'hidden
curriculum' in his book Life in Classrooms, and he is
generally cited as the originator of the term. Yet it appears
to have been used by William Waller in the early 1930s
There are many other terms and expressions which relate
closely to the term 'hidden curriculum' including:
• unwritten curriculum;
• null curriculum(Apple, 1979).

3. Features:
Coined by Philip Jackson.
Process that involves the transmission of norms and values as
well as a body of socially approved knowledge.
People learn things that are not actually taught in the formal
curriculum.
A term used to describe the unwritten rules and
expectations of behavior that we all seem to know, but
were never taught (Jackson,1968).

4. Definition:
 The hidden curriculum is the set of
assumed knowledge that is
generally not directly taught
because it is considered to be
universally known and understood
(Demirel, 2007).

5. Definition:
 Hidden curriculum is referred to as a second
curriculum and referred to names such as “the
hidden curriculum”, “secret curriculum”, “stored
curriculum “ or “non-written curriculum “, but it
does not provide a clear and distinctive elements
of the official curriculum for students, such as
feelings, values, attitudes and habits of the
official curriculum of the correct knowledge
is stated to be more effective (Yüksel, 2004).

6.  The term hidden curriculum refers to
the unwritten, unprinted, unofficial
and often unintended lessons, values
and perspectives that students learn
in school (Abott, 2015).

7.  Hidden curriculum is apart from the
objectives and activities in official
program, not explicitly defined, unwritten
and a curriculum of emerging
information, ideas and practices arising
during the process of learning and
teaching (Gorden, 1984).

8. Hidden curriculum emphasizes the point
that can be seen in a way that the students
desire to gain, not explicitly mentioned in
the official curriculum, written and
unwritten, and to learn the information
through real experiences, ideas and
values (Lynch,1989).

9. Hidden curriculum is described as “hidden”
because it is usually unacknowledged or
unexamined by the students, teachers and the
wider community while the lessons reinforced
are often accepted as status quo by the
community (Humes, 2008).

10. This curriculum whose principles, practices
and purposes are not written explicitly
makes up the school’s physical conditions,
psychological environment, administrators
and teachers’ non-written or non-stability
attitudes and behaviors (Yüksel, 2004).

11.  Hidden curriculum indicates that teachers and
administrators’ behaviors, conversations and approaches
for students, cooperative and competitive education,
quality of school climate, research or memorization of
teaching process, teaching staff’s values, learning
environment created by the school, in short, students’
attitudes and behaviors of interactions in the school
(Sarı, 2007).

12.  The hidden curriculum is based on the recogni-
tion that students absorb lessons in school that
may not be part of the formal curriculum, for
example: how students interact with their peers;
how they interact with teachers and other adults;
how they should perceive different races, groups
or classes of people and what ideas and
behavior are considered acceptable or
unacceptable (Humes, 2008).

13.  According to Tezcan (2003), hidden curriculum has many
factors which make up school’s socio-cultural frame. Many
factors such as behaviors of teachers and administrators,
attitudes, approaches, beliefs, values, quality of the school’s
atmosphere, values, interaction pattern providing students with
non-written rules in school-environment, routines, discipline,
obedience to authority constitute this social frame. There is a
hidden curriculum in all schools or education institutions no
matter what level of organizational function and the quality of
education provided (p.12).

14. The concept of Hidden Curriculum:
 Hidden curriculum concepts include very
valuable and useful concepts in thinking and
action. Non-academic aspects of higher
education and informal aspects of higher
education refers to the affect that the entire
educational system to the prevailing philosophy,
structure and overall texture of the
community (Cornbleth,1984).

15.  This concept refers to a set of learning in higher
education system in the context of culture
learning environment is achieved without
considering the knowledge of faculty members
and students. The concept of hidden curriculum,
indicate that the matters that occur in the form of
the hidden curriculum are not controllable and
predictable by teachers and coaches (Cornbleth,1984).

16. The Logic of Hidden Curriculum :
Portelli (1993) emphasizes that the term is 'hidden' and not 'hiding'. He suggests
that there are three possible options in terms of logic:
• X actually hid himself/herself, that is X is responsible for the hiding, X is an
agent;
• X was intentionally concealed by someone else (Y);
• X is concealed, X is hidden unintentionally.
Portelli (1993) proceeds to argue that the hidden curriculum is not
an agent and so the first option is incorrect. The other two options
are possible, especially when it is remembered that a curriculum
could be hidden from one person but not another (p.117)

17. Various factors in shaping the
hidden curriculum:
1 – Architecture and building quality of the school
or university – Educational environment such as
colour, light, sound, equipment yard, narrow and
long corridors of the college or university all have
educational effects.

18. 2 – The relationship between faculty
members and students – Attitude and
behavior of faculty members play an
important role in the formation of
student’s attitude.

19. 3 – Relations between individual students and
staff together – Within universities and higher
education numerous formal or informal human
relationships is formed and each have their own
educational work (Durkheim, 1961).

20. THEORIES OF HIDDEN
CURRICULUM :
Various studies have been
conducted on review of
hidden curriculum
theories:

21.  Hidden curriculum is acknowledged as the socialization
process of schooling. Accordingly, Drebeen (1968)
argues that each student has different parental
background and when each attends to school, he/she
encounters the norms of schools that will prepare them to
involve in the life of public sphere(s). He defines these
norms as “independence”, “achievement”,
“universalism”, and “specificity” and suggested that
these norms are required to teach them in order
to collaborate with modern industrial society
(p. 88).

22.  Lynch (1989) argues that schools have universalistic
and particularistic hidden aspects that enable an unequal
environment for students. Although some of them are
visible such as syllabuses, school time and exam
procedures that might be accepted as universalistic,
some of them are hidden such as social activities,
reward systems that might be accepted as particularistic
(p. 90).

23.  Giroux (2001) identifies hidden curriculum
as what is being taught and how one learns
in the school as he also indicates that
schools not only provides instruction but
also more such as norms and principles
experienced by students throughout their
education life (p. 770).

24.  Margolis (2001) argues that hidden
curriculum, the school and classroom life,
is the reproduction of schooling that
enables to understand schools‟
hegemonic function(s) that also maintains
power of state (p.53).

25. IMPLICATIONS OF HIDDEN
CURRICULUM:
 Hidden curriculum is important as much as formal
curriculum.
 Hidden curriculum is often ignored in classroom
management.
 Students often forget the lessons/topic taught by the
teacher after several years but the effect of hidden
curriculum remains in his/her mind.

26.  Hidden curriculum practices are transmitted to student
intentionally or unintentionally.
 Social relationship between teachers and students is
affected by hidden curriculum.
 Hidden curriculum may contribute undesirable
behaviors, conflicts or encouragement to
others.

27.  Cultural expectation, values and perspective affect an individual.
 The school culture and manifestation of hidden curriculum varies on every
institution.
 Some practices in school can be considered “status quo” if one cannot
distinguish between right or wrong. It’s about time to unfold and find solutions
to improve the teaching and learning process, thereby improving the quality of
both teachers and students.
 Be aware of our own hidden curriculum inside the classroom
(Debbie, 2015).

28. Concluding remark:
To sum up, the hidden curriculum as a socialization of schooling can
be identified by the social interactions within an environment. Thus,
it is in process at all times, and serves to transmit tacit messages to
students about values, attitudes and principles. Hidden curriculum
can reveal through an evaluation of the environment and the
unexpected, unintentional interactions between teachers and
students which revealed critical pedagogy (Jerald, 2006).

29. Reference:
Abbott, S. E. (2015). Hidden curriculum : Glossary of education reform. Maine: Portland Press
Herald.
Apple, M.W. (1979). Ideology and curriculum. London: Routledge and Kegan Paul.
Cornbleth, C. (1984). Beyond hidden curriculum. Journal of Curriculum Studies ,16 (1):29–36.
Debbie, J. (2015). Value of hidden curriculum. Port of Spain, Trinidad & Tobago: Guardian
Media Limited.
Demirel, Ö. (2007). Eğitimde program geliştirme. Ankara: Pegem A Yayınlar.
Dreeben, R. (1967). What is learned in school. London: Addison-Wesley.
Durkheim, E (1961). Moral education. New York: Free Press.
Giroux, H. A. (2001). Theory and resistance in education. London: Bergin & Garvey.

30. Reference:
Gorden, L. (1984). Cultural production and social re-production. British Journal of Sociology of
Education, 5, 105-115.
Humes, W. (2008). Never discount the hidden curriculum. Aberdeen, Scotland: Aberdeen
University.
Jackson, P., W. (1968). Life in Classrooms. New York: Holt, Reinhart & Winston.
Jerald, C.D. (2006). School culture: The hidden curriculum. Washington, DC: The Center for
Comprehensive School Reform and Improvement. retrieved from
www.centerforcsri.org
Lynch, K. (1989). The hidden curriculum: reproduction in education, a reappraisal. London:
The Flamer Press.

31. Reference:
Margolis, E. (2001). The hidden curriculum in higher education. New York & London:
Rutledge.
Portelli, J. P. (1993). Exposing the hidden curriculum. Journal of Curriculum Studies, 25(4),
pp. 343-58.
Sarı, M. (2007). Demokratik değerlerin kazanımı sürecinde örtük program, düşük ve yüksek
okul yaşam kalitesine sahip iki ilköğ-retim nitel bir çalışma. Yayımlanmamış doktora
tezi, Çukurova Üniversitesi Sosyal Bilimler Enstitüsü, Adana.
Tezcan, M. (2003). Gizli müfredat, eğitim sosyolojisi açısından bir kavram çözümlemesi. Türk
Eğitim Bilimleri Dergisi, 1 (1), 53-59.
Yuksel, S. (2005). Kohlberg and hidden curriculum in moral education: An opportunity for
students’ acquisition of moral values in the new Turkish primary education program.
Busa, Turkey: Department of Educational Sciences, University of Uluday.