Ɔ unstated assumptions
about people and how they
learn … that invisibly
guide whatever educational processes
may occur there … an unintentional hidden curriculum
In other
words, you learn how to learn in a particular way through sharing
culturally-based patterns of behaviour. “In every culture there are unstated
assumptions about people and how they learn … that invisibly guide whatever
educational processes may occur there … [these assumptions] work as an
unintentional hidden curriculum” (Singleton 1991).
For
example, if we turn to school learning, what happens in a classroom, the
visible behaviour of teachers and students, is the result of a framework of
expectations, attitudes, values and beliefs that are usually taken for
granted … beliefs about how to teach and learn, attitudes towards visual
rather than auditory input, accepted routines to process information in a
global rather than an analytical way, communication patterns, and so on.
These are all things that we are not usually aware of, until … until
something forces us to challenge our assumptions: for instance, the arrival
of a learner from a different cultural background – it’s what’s happening to
many teachers in Italy today – many of us are suddenly being faced with the
reality of a multicultural class.
