A set of unwritten, often unintentional lessons students learn in school that shape their behavior, values, and identity.
Hidden Curriculum Consequences
Reinforcing social inequality, limiting student potential, and creating mental health issues can result from the hidden curriculum.
Teachers as Agents of Hidden Curriculum
Teachers' biases, classroom routines, and interactions with students can shape the hidden curriculum, while students use strategies like conformity, resistance, or subverting to navigate it.
Hidden Curriculum Consequences
The hidden curriculum can significantly impact student outcomes, including engagement, social inequality, and education and learning, with consequences including missed opportunities, pedagogical inefficiencies, and systemic injustice.
Common Hidden Curriculum Examples
A range of hidden curriculum examples includes gendered language, cultural homogenization, ability-blind pedagogy, religious or spiritual exclusion, classism, ableism, and heteronormativity, among others.
Strategies for Addressing Hidden Curriculum
Strategies include critical pedagogy, inclusive language, culturally responsive teaching, universal design for learning, professional development, student reflection and feedback, and policy and procedure changes.
