Skip to main content

The Hidden Curriculum

The first year is done and so, in my effort to procrastinate on working on the dreaded certification exam that we have been hearing contradictory information about all year (the exam is required for first year doctoral students in my program to determine if we get to stay), I thought I would take some time to reflect on the other kind of learning that has happened this year.

This is the learning that is not within the curriculum. It is not what is necessarily intentionally taught but is the growth that happens alongside the theories and articles and papers and statistics that we learn in the classroom. In education, we call this the hidden curriculum, which usually refers to the ways in which children are socialized to learn their "place" in society, such as along class lines. Making children walk the halls in quiet, orderly lines, emphasizing Standard English over student dialects are ways in which the hidden curriculum silently, subtly, teaches children what society demands of them.

For me, the hidden curriculum at Teachers College has fortunately been positive (this has been intentional). In this past year, I have become more confident in my place in the world and feel closer in discovering what part I want to play in it. Thanks to some wonderful professors, the doubts that I came into the program with (about not belonging, about being dumb, about my incompetence) have become manageable. I would say they are completely gone but I know that those thoughts will likely come and go as I face new challenges.

We have been taught to think critically about everything, to never accept that anything has to be the way it is. We have learned to think transformatively instead of with resignation. Here, surrounded by people who think critically of everything, I have realized that there are subtle ways in which we are disciplined into thinking certain ways and that it is our job to fight back against this.

Ironically, the criticality has led me to also run away from the Academy in some ways. I appreciate people who do not spend their entire lives living in their heads. They are people of action and of joy. Being critical can make you forget what joy means at times. Sometimes a five minute conversation about our favorite types of pants is very necessary.

It has been interesting reflecting on the many ups and downs. During a week when it seemed that everything was going amazingly well, I reflected on the ups and downs and knew that this winning streak would come to an end (which it did). But the converse to that is that a bad streak must end some time too. Learning to live in calm serenity with that is my ultimate goal.

I have learned that nothing we do is done in isolation. We are and must work with others to create lasting change. Every paper I have written this year, every assignment I have written, every presentation I have given, every test I have studied for, has been done with help from others. This thought has been very important for me. It reminds me that no matter what work I accomplish, it will be done as part of a collective. I am thus humbled and grounded and grateful.

When the program started I, out of pure self preservation because I felt I did not belong, decided that I did not need friends. And the result was that for the first seven months, I was miserable and hated living in NYC. But now I've come to feel the love of my classmates and coworkers. The city doesn't feel as lifeless as it did before. I will never be a New Yorker, but I think I can handle the next few years. Let's see what Year 2 has to offer.


Comments

Popular posts from this blog

Swinging into School

Well, kind of. We had orientation three days this week and had a chance to meet our fellow LLEES classmates. The program is truly international with students from Taiwan, Germany, China, Korea, Greece, Basque, Bangladesh, Iran and Mexico. There are only twelve of us right now but there are two students from Ghana and one from Nigeria who haven’t been able to make it due to visa issues. Besides being international, the areas of interest vary a great deal so it will be fascinating learning about everyone’s thesis topics and professional experiences. The inside of the cathedral Life on campus has changed dramatically. When I first got to Turku, you would see a few tourists hanging around the cathedral, which is on the edge of the University of Turku and Åbo Academy campuses (there are three universities in Turku, the third is Turku School of Applied Sciences). Now the area has throngs of students walking to and from the city center to the universities. Coming from a unive...

Reflections On Becoming A Teacher

This is something I wrote just trying to think about some of the things we have been learning and thinking about. My classes this semester are much more interesting and leave me feeling like connections are coming at me left right and center but the only way for me to process these connections is to write. So here is the first of (hopefully) many where I synthesize the ideas that are going through my head. I invite you to think with me and grow with me by commenting below (I do see your comments! I may even reply :) ) I want to spend some time reflecting on what I have been learning lately. My classes have been converging towards the practical spaces, realities and pedagogies that go into creating a multicultural, anti-racist educational system. I am drawing on three readings in this reflection that came from the same course. All were about teacher education. Two were easy to contrast. One was called the pedagogy of difference and the other was called the pedagogy of fear. The fi...

Change of Pace

A view of the Turku archipelago in the frigid weather. PC: Sami All of my time in the past month has been spent with doing one of two things: preparing for next year and making sure I get done with this year. The flurry of activity has been a welcome change to the rather luxuriously slow pace that had been defining my days up until now but in the process, this blog has fallen by the wayside. So what are these many things that have been taking up my time?   1.      Ice skating This is by far not what has occupied most of my time, but I think it has been the most refreshing. Last year I went ice skating only once and, as thrilling as it was, never got around to going again. Plus, the weather last year was so mild that you had to take advantage of cold days when they came to get much time on the ice. This year has been much better and ice skating has been a great excuse to bring people together. It’s this year’s version of chai. Thanks to my mo...