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Article published In:
Policy and practice in early language learning
Edited by Janet Enever and Patricia Driscoll
[AILA Review 32] 2019
► pp. 36–63
CLASSROOM PEDAGOGY

The hidden curriculum of work in English language education

Neoliberalism and early English programs in public schooling

| The Ohio State University

There has been a rapid global expansion of English instruction in the early grades in public school curricula. Particularly in so-called developing countries, the increase of and its shift from exclusively private to public education is linked to the idea that acquiring English promotes personal, social, and economic development. The author takes one case of a recent early English program, the national program in Mexico, and argues that it is a representative case of a language education programme and policy organized around neoliberal principles. The policy’s stated goal is to address issues of access and equity for public school students; however, findings indicate that the actual processes of teaching and learning at the classroom level remain highly stratified across social class lines. An analysis of English lessons in schools at different points on the socioeconomic spectrum illustrates that instruction is preparing children with certain types of skills and dispositions congruent to their class position and revealing the hidden curriculum of work in early English education.

Keywords: English for young learners, Mexico, hidden curriculum, social class and language pedagogy, neoliberalism, human capital
Article outline
  • Introduction
  • Methodology: An impact study of the early English programme in Mexican public schools
  • How social class shapes English classrooms in Mexico: Three schools compared
    • The working-class school
    • The teachers and students
    • The lesson
    • The middle-class school
    • The teachers and students
    • The lesson
    • The affluent school
    • The teachers and students
    • The lesson
    • Outliers, teacher rotation, and teachers’ social class
  • The hidden curriculum of work, human capital theory, and neoliberalism
  • The myth of opportunity: Human capital theory and early English programmes as neoliberal education policy
  • Implications and conclusions: Educating language teachers as critical practitioners
  • Notes
  • References
Available under the Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial (CC BY-NC) 4.0 license.

For any use beyond this license, please contact the publisher at [email protected].

Published online: 7 April 2020
DOI logo
https://doi.org/10.1075/aila.00020.say
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