A Descriptive Study Into the Nature of School Effectiveness: Social and Cognitive Curriculum in Two Third Grade Classrooms.

The purpose of this study was to explore how ascribed characteristics of a school, according to school effectiveness research, get worked out at the building level and the classroom level with respect to curricular processes, staff development, classroom instruction, and school achievement. A multi-disciplinary approach was used in a five- and -one-half month descriptive study of social and cognitive curriculum of two third grade classrooms within one "effective" urban elementary school and its community. The corpus of data consists of 1,158 pages of field notes, 11 audiocassettes, 4 videocassettes, 375 pages of educational documents, 35 interviews, 218 pages of children's work, and 100 photographs. Data analysis consisted of type-case analysis in search of recurrent patterns in how social and cognitive curriculum was manifested for students. Aggregate basic skill and academic achievement data was analyzed across content areas for individual students according to reading group placement. Overall findings revealed a fragmented and narrow curriculum oriented to tested skills, deliberate academic tracking across two classrooms, divergent academic expectations and opportunities across two classrooms, academic failure among compensatory education students and others, and a highly controlled behavior environment throughout the school. The findings suggest that the construct of "effective school", as presently defined in the literature, is paradoxical and problematic; that basic skill and academic achievement tests do not reveal nor necessarily promote social and cognitive processes related to students' educational development; and , that reorganization of a school's social and cognitive curriculum in terms of an "effectiveness" label may jeopardize equal educational opportunity and educational equity.PhDCurriculum developmentUniversity of Michiganhttp://deepblue.lib.umich.edu/bitstream/2027.42/161356/1/8712066.pd