A hidden curriculum is a side effect of an education, " which are learned but not openly intended” such as the transmission of norms, values, and beliefs conveyed in the classroom and the social environment.
Any learning experience may teach unintended lessons. Hidden curriculum often refers to knowledge gained in primary and secondary school settings, usually with a negative connotation where the school strives for equal intellectual development. In this sense, a hidden curriculum reinforces existing social inequalities by educating students according to their class and social status. The unequal distribution of cultural capital in a society mirrors a corresponding distribution of knowledge among its students.
Read more about Hidden Curriculum: Educational History, Sources, Function, Higher Education and Tracking, Literary References
Famous quotes containing the words hidden and/or curriculum:
“A hidden strength
Which if Heav’n gave it, may be term’d her own:
‘Tis chastity, my brother, chastity:
She that has that, is clad in compleat steel,
And like a quiver’d Nymph with Arrows keen
May trace huge Forests, and unharbour’d Heaths,
Infamous Hills, and sandy perilous wildes,
Where through the sacred rayes of Chastity,
No savage fierce, Bandite, or mountaneer
Will dare to soyl her Virgin purity,”
—John Milton (1608–1674)
“If we focus exclusively on teaching our children to read, write, spell, and count in their first years of life, we turn our homes into extensions of school and turn bringing up a child into an exercise in curriculum development. We should be parents first and teachers of academic skills second.”
—Neil Kurshan (20th century)