An Analysis of the Hidden Curriculum in Teaching Readers Theater

• Main Authors: Yu Hui Lin, 林玉惠
• Other Authors: Su-ching Lin, Ph. D.
• Format: Others
• Language: zh-TW
• Published: 2010
• Online Access: http://ndltd.ncl.edu.tw/handle/84531952102091013606

碩士 === 國立彰化師範大學 === 教育研究所 === 99 === The purpose of this study is to analyze the Hidden Curriculum in Teaching Readers Theater. There are three objectives of conducting research: 1. Determining the meaning and value for the teacher in adopting (performing) Readers Theater. 2. Discovering the hidden curriculum in Readers Theater scripts. 3. Researching the process during teaching the courses of the hidden curriculum of Readers Theater. The participants consisted of A and B classes selected from a junior high school in Miaoli County. The research had been implemented for 16 weeks. During the research period, the data is collected through performance, observation, interview and document (feedback) analysis. The major findings of this study are as follows: A. The teacher’s intentions in using Readers Theater Teaching are to: make the English curriculum more lively to students, enhance students’ listening and speaking skills, raise low-achieving students’ interest in learning English, encourage the students to be open-minded and display two-way thinking, and enhance students’ reading and communicating skill. B. The hidden curriculum of the Reader’s Theater Teaching of scripts include: 1. Students learn from characters and script to: love and respect yourself, be healthy, have a positive attitude, and accept and appreciate the peers with different cultures and beliefs. 2. Students learn from the special events: humility, filialness, piety, respect, forgiveness, acceptance, empathy, sincerity, equality, charity, minority, making them a valuable asset to the class. 3. Students learned from the spirit ideas such as: “Don’t judge people by their appearance,” “independent thinking and judgments,” “have the responsibility to take care of minority,” and “equality and valuable life”. C. There are positive and negative aspects in adopting hidden curriculum through Readers Theater Teaching. The positive aspects are: 1. The interaction between teachers and students are terrific. (2) Interaction with peers teaches students how to: treasure peers’ praise and learn from criticism, enjoy the changes in yourself and in peers, learn how to give constructive criticism while supporting other people's ideas. (3)The teacher’s teaching motivation is to help students build a wonderful English foundation. (4)The teacher’s teaching style is to be both strict and serious in teaching, while teaching in a humorous and unique style. The negative aspects are: (1)If some students have bad relationships with other students in the class, they can’t perform together, and will feel left out as a result. (2)In the cooperative learning environment, there are discrepancies in some students’ attitudes (for example: when the teacher is watching versus when the teacher isn’t watching). (3)Due to the nature of character roles in the scripts, some roles will be larger than others. Some students think that there may be an uneven distribution of roles within the script, resulting in disagreements over certain roles. The suggestions are also included in this study for future related studies and for improving Readers Theater Teaching in the future.