Classed Beginnings: Status Socialization in Two Preschool Classrooms

Abstract

Research on class inequality in education shows how the hidden curriculum—the tacit yet systematic lessons taught alongside the official curriculum—tends to favor the cultural capital that class-advantaged students bring from home over that of their less advantaged peers. This ethnography instead explores variation in what schools implicitly teach and how organizations potentially class their members. Comparing one Head Start with one tuition-charging preschool, the authors document how Head Start implicitly treats preschoolers, who are from predominantly disadvantaged backgrounds, as students who lack decision-making power and occupy the lowest position in a rigid status hierarchy. In contrast, the advantaged preschoolers were implicitly encouraged to take ownership of their actions, make the curriculum work for them, and activate support from teachers and administrators. Insofar as this “internal control” mindset of the tuition-charging preschool is favored in later academic and professional arenas, the authors argue that organizations can be agents of class socialization.

A compelling body of research on the reproduction of class inequality in education demonstrates how the hidden curriculum—the tacit yet systematic lessons that schools teach alongside the official curriculum (Anyon 1980; Apple and King 1977; Bernstein 1971; Bourdieu 1974; Ross and Ross 2000; Vallance 1973)—rewards students with certain kinds of cultural capital (Calarco 2014b; Lareau 2011). More specifically, home life can prepare students to navigate the hidden curriculum with varying levels of efficacy (Calarco 2014a; Lareau 2011; Streib 2011). For example, middle-class parents coach their children to use more assertive help-seeking strategies in the classroom (e.g., calling for, approaching, and interrupting teachers), resulting in middle-class students in mixed-class elementary classrooms receiving more teacher attention and achieving better academic outcomes than their lower and working-class peers (Calarco 2011, 2014a).

The above research is designed to illustrate how preexisting cultural capital is (1) mobilized by students and (2) rewarded in the classroom in a way that perpetuates class advantage. But in these accounts, variation in the institutional context is not the focus of the investigation. As single-institution studies, the classroom environment, per research design, is considered a fixed, exogenous factor. What varies and what must be explained is how students fit themselves into a given institutional setting.

In this study, we focus instead on how educational institutions might vary in how they socialize their students. Researchers have long recognized that the hidden curriculum can vary in consequential ways across institutional settings (e.g., Binder, Davis, and Bloom 2016; Johnson 2022; Kaufman and Feldman 2004; Stevens and Kirst 2015; Willie-LeBreton 2003). For example, Binder et al.’s (2016:22) study of career funneling at two elite colleges illustrates how educational institutions constitute unique ecologies that are best viewed as “generative systems of meaning and action.” Likewise, Johnson (2022:982) documents how variation in high school context shapes the academic success of engineering undergraduates in an elite program. Because class-advantaged high schools tend to feature more “collaborative instructional practices” compared with less class-advantaged high schools, students trained in the former are more successful in signaling that they are “good collaborators” and benefit more from collaborative learning opportunities when they get to college. From this perspective, institutions are strategic actors that directly and tangibly shape student identities, strategies, and outcomes.

Foundational studies in this vein emphasize that schools serving students from lower social class backgrounds compared with schools serving more socioeconomically advantaged student bodies feature similar overt curricula but substantively different hidden curricula, especially with regard to logics of control and relationships with authority (Anyon 1980, 1981; Apple and King 1977; Arum 2003; Bernstein 1971; Bourdieu 1974; Bowles and Gintis 1976; Martin 1998). ¹ In Bowles and Gintis’s (1976) classic work on the socializing role of schools, they argued that schools serving the least economically advantaged students feature a coercive authority structure characterized by repressiveness, and that similarly, schools serving working-class students emphasize behavioral control and rule following. In stark contrast, upper- and middle-class schools favor less direct supervision, more student participation, and internalized standards of control. Relatedly, Anyon (1981) found that schools serving students from lower and middle socioeconomic class backgrounds treated learning as the acquisition of facts and information, whereas schools serving students from affluent and elite social class backgrounds taught knowledge as process, application, and critical thinking. This difference is consequential because the authority styles that students are exposed to in school can shape students’ transition into the labor market (Bowles and Gintis 1976; Edwards 1979; MacLeod 2008; Willis and Aronowitz 1981); being socialized into one style of control facilitates “cultural fit” in some job sectors but not others (Bowles and Gintis 1976, 2002; Bowles, Gintis, and Meyer 1999). ²

Building on these insights, in this ethnographic study we explore how preschool institutions vary in terms of their hidden curricula and how these differences may contribute to the production of classed beings. Specifically, we compare the routine activities of two preschool classrooms, one classroom serving children from middle- and upper-class families and one classroom from a Head Start preschool, which enrolls students from lower socioeconomic backgrounds. Observing everyday comings and goings, we first describe how interaction styles and organizational practices differ by institution. Second, in line with Anyon (1980, 1981) and Bowles and Gintis (1976, 2002), we argue that these differences in routine practices constitute important differences in the hidden curriculum taught at each preschool. More specifically, the data suggest that the routines observed at Head Start are more likely to teach preschoolers to view themselves less as unique individuals and more as members of a ‘lowest rung’ group governed by external control. In contrast, we argue that daily routines at the preschool with more economically advantaged children likely steered their preschoolers toward an individualistic, center-of-attention orientation and reinforced a logic of internal control.

Below, we review the literature on class socialization in organizational contexts, describe our data, and then describe three main ways through which status socialization occurred in two preschool institutions vis-à-vis the hidden curriculum. The three types of organizational routines we discuss broadly fall under the umbrella of relational work (Zelizer 2012): how teachers exercise their status over students (teacher-student relations); the extent to which organizational practices empower students as autonomous decision makers through recognition of individuality; and the manner in which preschool staff members represent their own status position with respect to higher authorities. These three types of practices, we argue, help reveal how the educational system “fosters a pattern of status distinctions,” which “reinforces the stratified consciousness on which the fragmentation of subordinate economic classes is based” (Bowles et al. 1999:291).

Preschool Organizations and Status Socialization

Existing research on the preschool experience has focused on how preschools transmit values related to the formation of identity and social categories (Lubeck 1985; Martin 1998, 2000; Tobin, Wu, and Davidson 1989) and how preschoolers agentically mobilize cultural capital in preschool classrooms (Streib 2011). Little is known, however, about preschools’ hidden curricula, such as how preschools as institutions might implicitly serve as class and status socializing agents (see Gansen 2021 for a notable exception). As argued below, the material and social resources available in the preschool context may indeed be a critical time point for the development of class-specific selves and behaviors (Stephens, Markus, and Phillips 2014).

Organizations as Socializing Agents

A diverse array of work in organizational theory argues that the local culture of organizations affects the socialization and outcomes of individuals within them, such as producing, reinforcing, and legitimating social structures of power and status along gender, race, and class lines (Acker 1990, 2006; Ray 2019; Stephens et al. 2014; Turco 2010). These “inequality regimes” (Acker 2006) shape members via implicit organizational logics (e.g., McPherson and Sauder 2013; Ray 2019), organizational policies (e.g., Noonan, Estes, and Glass 2007; Oyer and Schaefer 2011), as well as local culture: the day-to-day practices and norms of operation enacted routinely by organizational members (Bowles et al. 1999; Ray 2019; Turco 2010).

As noted, schools can vary both in terms of the overt curricular knowledge they offer but also in their hidden curricula, such as the language codes and teaching styles they use (Anyon 1980, 1981; Bernstein 1971, 1996; Bowles and Gintis 1976; Stephens et al. 2014). Anyon’s (1980) pioneering research, for example, demonstrated how a key distinction between working- versus upper-class schools was not curricular content per se but how students were instructed to engage in learning. In the working-class schools observed, students were taught that to work is to follow rote procedure: “teachers rarely explain why the work is being assigned, how it might connect to other assignments, or what the idea is that lies behind the procedure or gives it coherence and perhaps meaning or significance” (Anyon 1980:73). In contrast, in the “affluent professional” school observed, student were taught that work is an active, independent, and creative activity, where students are routinely “asked to express and apply ideas and concepts” and to make active decisions about what constitutes appropriate methods and material (Anyon 1980:79). Hidden in these approaches to schoolwork are messages about a student’s relationship to their work and other people, which is one way schools socialize their students into classed positions. ³

The Significance of the Preschool Context for Classed Socialization

Preschools are a unique institutional gateway between the family and school and likely constitute unusually important sites of class and status socialization. First, since 2000, roughly 50 percent of three- and four-year-old children attended preschool in the United States (National Center for Education Statistics 2013, 2019a, 2019b), rendering preschool classrooms the first experience with educational institutions for approximately half the nation. Researchers already view preschools as a crucial agent of socialization in general (Lubeck 1985; Martin 1998); a period of transition from home to school, preschool is designed to teach the norms and ‘rules of engagement’ of a classroom so that children are ready for kindergarten (Carbonaro 2005; Piotrkowski 2004; Snow and Páez 2004).

Specifically, past research suggests that preschools are an important site for the transmission of values related to the formation of identity, such as nationality (Tobin et al. 1989), gender (Martin 1998), and race (Lubeck 1985). Schools and teachers transmit messages to preschoolers through bodily adornment, mode of address, discipline, control of the voice, bodily instructions, and physical interactions (Lubeck 1985; Martin 1998; Tobin et al. 1989). For example, Martin (1998) found that preschool girls are more likely to be directed to speak more quietly and guided to more passive activities like art and reading, in contrast to their male classmates, who are less frequently shushed and engage in more active play. Additionally, preschoolers are found to be capable of social processes relevant to stratification such as social closure (Schaefer et al. 2010) and recognition of signals of social class (Vandebroeck 2021).

Second, unlike compulsory schooling, preschools are not centrally regulated by federal policy (Kamerman and Gatenio-Gabel 2007) and thus generally exhibit less uniformity in curriculum and structure (Lubeck 1985). Preschool experiences can thus range from highly informal settings reminiscent of home to formal structured classrooms located inside K–6 or K–12 schools (Lubeck 1985). Taken together with the point that preschools are supposed to teach young children how to be ready for formal schooling (i.e., who is in control and how to control oneself), this lack of organizational regulation means that there is potentially a great deal of variation in the hidden curriculum, and specifically around the logic of control, which we know from the vast literature on childrearing styles (Lareau 2011) and job sector control (Edwards 1979; Gottesman 2013) is a major axis of class distinction. Middle- and upper-class parenting styles and occupations align with an internal logic of control in which internalization of rules and reason-based decision making is prioritized. In contrast, working- and lower-class parenting styles and occupations align with an external logic of control in which responsiveness to authority is prioritized (Bowles and Gintis 1976; Edwards 1979; Lareau 2011).

Third, given that parents tend to self-select into preschools, preschool is likely to be a transition in which students experience alignment between family and school language and interaction styles because parents are likely to choose places that makes sense to them. Self-selection of preschools by class occurs on the basis of price of tuition and access (e.g., membership in a community or organization, income qualifications), but also childrearing philosophy (Kim and Fram 2009; Yamamoto and Li 2012). Research shows that children first learn class-specific language codes and modes of being in the home, resulting in distinctive, classed speech and interaction patterns before entering school (Bernstein 1971; Calarco 2014a; Lareau 2011). Middle-class parenting styles feature reason and negotiation-based language codes, model an interventionist approach to interactions with institutions and authority figures, and foster a sense of entitlement and confidence in children (Bernstein 1971; Lareau 2011). Working- and lower-class parenting styles feature directive-based language codes, model deferential interaction with institutions and authority figures, and foster a sense of constraint, distance, and distrust in children (Bernstein 1971; Lareau 2011). Alignment thus occurs when parents choose institutions that serve to reinforce the lessons from the family (Stephens et al. 2014). When children are exposed to the same language codes and interaction styles across multiple contexts, this alignment can naturalize these interaction styles into unified, class-specific identities (Martin 1998; Stephens et al. 2014). Preschools are thus a vital site of study for understanding the formative experiences that contribute to and solidify the cultural capital students bring with them into future classroom settings.

In summary, given the socializing role of organizations and the importance of the preschool context with respect to early alignment, we seek to develop insights about what transpires in preschool organizations that could contribute to status socialization. To this end, we compare the everyday routines of two preschools that differ in the social class of their client base. The goal is to identify the ways in which routines differ by preschool and how classed messages are transmitted through their respective organizational practices.

Methods and Data

The data come from a comparative ethnographic study conducted in two preschool classrooms in spring 2010. The two preschool classrooms were chosen on the basis of the distinct social class background of the families they served. The first preschool, University Tots (a pseudonym ⁴ ), was affiliated with a small private liberal arts college and was partially funded by the college. The preschool operated out of a converted single-family house with four classrooms divided by age, from infant through preschool. The student body was predominantly the children of the college’s faculty members, staff members, and alumni, although the preschool also accepted children of students and would accept the children of community members if enrollment was below capacity. The specific classroom under observation, however, was composed of only the children of faculty members, staff members, and alumni at the time of observation. Tuition was $512 or $813 per month (for a half or a full day). In 2010, this rate was comparable with the national average ($611 per month) (Economic Policy Institute 2010). The classroom opened at 8 a.m. and closed at 5:30 p.m.; full-day students arrived between 8 and 8:30 a.m. and left by 5:30 p.m., while half-day students left during naptime, around 1 p.m. There were 12 preschoolers in this classroom (3 girls and 9 boys), ages 2.5 to 4 years, and all were white non-Hispanic, except for 1 adopted Hispanic child of white non-Hispanic parents. There were two main teachers, both of whom were white non-Hispanic women. ⁵ Teachers at this preschool, however, moved fluidly across the four classrooms when substitutes were needed, and therefore preschoolers were exposed to different teachers, not all of whom were white non-Hispanic. We coded this classroom as middle/upper class because of (1) the price of tuition and (2) the priority access to college-affiliated families (predicting average level of parent education, and the occupations of parents) (Anyon 1981; Edwards 1979).

The second preschool setting observed was a Head Start classroom located within (and sharing facilities with) a local district school building. Head Start is a federally funded early education program limited to families with incomes below federal poverty guidelines with free tuition (Early Childhood Learning & Knowledge Center 2020). ⁶ The Head Start classroom offered morning or afternoon classes; the class under observation was the afternoon class, with students arriving at 1 p.m. and leaving at 4 p.m. The Head Start class was in total one group of 14 preschoolers (4 boys and 10 girls) ranging from age three to five years, all of whom were nested within one physical classroom. Seven preschoolers were white non-Hispanic, 5 were Hispanic, and 2 were African American. In this classroom there were three teachers; one white non-Hispanic woman, one Hispanic woman, and one Black woman. We coded this classroom as lower/working class because of the restriction of the program to those living in poverty (Anyon 1981; Edwards 1979).

The first author spent 80 hours observing both classrooms, spread evenly between the two classrooms over the course of eight consecutive weeks. In the University Tots classroom, she observed daily for three weeks, arriving at 8 a.m. before the first students and leaving during nap time (early afternoon) on half of the observation days, and arriving during nap and leaving after the last student had been picked up at 5:30 p.m. the other half of the observation days. In the Head Start classroom, she observed two days per week for six weeks, arriving before the students arrived at 1 p.m. and leaving after the last student had been picked up in the evening. Observations in the University Tots classroom occurred during the first three weeks of the observation period, and observations in Head Start began during week 3 of the observation period and ran through week 8. In each classroom, she sat or stood within earshot of the class and teachers, listening to the conversations and observing the goings-on of the preschoolers and teachers. She paid particular attention to components of the hidden curriculum, such as daily pacing, transitions, structure of activities, use of space, and conversations and interactions between teachers and preschoolers, including instances of discipline and instruction. Handwritten fieldnotes were taken in a notebook in real time in response to all she observed (8–15 pages per day), including summary descriptions of activities and what happened throughout the day, and direct quotations from observed interactions including teacher instruction and direction, managed transitions, argument resolution, and casual conversations. She also conducted informal, unstructured interviews with teachers in both classrooms about classroom practices and the official curriculum. She took an unobtrusive observer position in each classroom, but did interfere in situations involving child safety, and she did respond to preschoolers who directly solicited her attention or help, which was rare overall. After each day of observation, the first author transcribed her handwritten fieldnotes into electronic records and reflected on them (5–7 typed, single-spaced pages). Fieldnotes were analyzed manually, with a focus on comparing and contrasting instances of socialization of class at each preschool.

Findings

Through a portfolio of daily practices, we assert that the hidden curriculum transmits class-specific messages to preschoolers about the social order of the preschool classroom, and their place within it (Figure 1). We find that the Head Start classroom constructed a hierarchical social structure, of which their lower-class preschoolers are portrayed to occupy the lowest rung. In contrast, the more affluent preschool classroom constructed a nonhierarchical, child-centric social structure, in which their middle- and upper-class preschoolers are the center of a relational web of support.

Figure 1.

Enacted hierarchy in each preschool setting: (a) Head Start and (b) University Tots.

The class-specific social structure of each classroom, we find, is enacted through at least three different status socialization practices: (1) the direct modeling of authority relations through teacher-student interaction, (2) the practice of encouraging or discouraging preschoolers to act as decision maker, and (3) the framing of “higher authorities.” Through these practices, students are taught lessons about their role in social structure, who is above them, and their level of control over self and situation. To be clear, our goal is to describe the practices that preschoolers are exposed to in these two organizational settings and demonstrate how they contain implicit messages pertaining to social status and the student role. Our data, however, cannot address the origins of these practices, why practices differ between the classrooms, or the extent to which students internalize classed messages. We attend to these limitations in the discussion.

Organizational Practice 1: Modeling Authority Relations through Teacher-Preschooler Interaction

The first way that preschools teach logics of control through the hidden curriculum is via the direct modeling of authority relations in teacher-student relationships. Teachers in both preschools ostensibly played the same role: they were all tasked with managing and educating their preschoolers, and in this way occupied structurally equivalent positions as authorities over preschoolers. And yet we observed that the teacher-student relationship differed starkly across the two preschools with respect to how that authority was styled.

Language is a powerful class socialization tool (Lareau 2011), and the use of language codes to teach “who’s in charge” was a striking difference in the hidden curriculum between Head Start and University Tots. At Head Start, preschoolers were taught by way of teacher-student interaction that authority figures impose control and that “good” learners follow orders. At University Tots, teachers exercised authority over preschoolers but did so in a manner that directly encouraged preschoolers to recognize their own decision-making power.

When teachers issue direct commands using phrases such as “you have to,” “you’re supposed to,” “no,” and “you are going to,” teachers signal that they are overtly in control and transmit that preschoolers have little choice or say. Such statements were commonly observed at Head Start. Below are several examples of teachers at Head Start issuing direct commands:

2/11/10: At the bathroom Melissa stands with me outside of the bathroom and Rachelle (teacher) says to her, “go use the restroom and wash your hands.” When Melissa doesn’t respond right away, Rachelle repeats, (after only a very short pause) “go use the restroom and wash your hands.”

2/9/10: Tiffany (teacher) says, “you need to sit down while brushing your teeth.”

3/16/10: Tiffany (teacher) says to her group, “This is what we’re gonna do today: You guys are gonna write down your name on the paper and then we’re gonna write down all the numbers.”

In contrast, teachers at University Tots were more likely to appeal to their preschool charges from the perspective of helping young learners take control of themselves. Phrases such as “I would like you to,” “you can,” and “let’s” and the use of the word please to give commands or directions represent a style of authority that underscores internal control because such phrasing leaves room for the student to see that they have a choice in the matter and can make decisions to do something for themselves. Commands framed as suggestions were used more often than direct commands at University Tots.

A particularly illustrative set of examples came from observing how teachers helped resolve preschoolers’ problems using teacher- versus student-controlled approaches. At University Tots, teachers typically responded to arguments between two preschoolers or student problem-solving frustration by helping preschoolers help themselves. In other words, teachers used their authority to empower preschoolers to become decision makers (e.g., “what are you going to say to him?” or “how are you going to fix that?”).

1/28/10: Christopher and Maddie get into a tiff. Maddie says to Charlotte (teacher), “he hit me!” Charlotte says, “ah man, I hate when that happens! What’re you gonna do about it?” Maddie says, “Christopher, don’t hit me!” Charlotte says, “good job, you figured out what to say!”

The teachers at University Tots even gave options to the preschoolers if needed, but importantly maintained that preschoolers upset about an issue were ultimately responsible for solving their problems.

2/5/10: Maddie smashes down the water pitcher on the table when she passes it to John, splashing water on him. Linda (teacher) says, “oh! John, what are you gonna do? What are you going to say to Maddie?” John starts to cry, and Linda says, “uh-uh, no, use your words. What are you gonna say to Maddie? Do you wanna say, ‘don’t splash me’? What can Maddie do to make it better?” Charlotte (teacher) adds, “Maddie, sometimes kids say, ‘oops, I’m sorry I splashed you—I didn’t mean to.’”

By helping the preschoolers to solve their own problems but not solving them for them, the teachers at University Tots used their authority to impart a logic of internal control: “good” citizens take responsibility for solving their problems and resolving their conflicts. This skillset is highly aligned with some occupational sectors but not others (Bowles and Gintis 1976; Bowles et al. 1999; Edwards 1979).

In stark contrast, preschoolers at Head Start were implicitly taught to depend on authority figures for problem solving and conflict resolution. At Head Start, some internal control language was deployed (e.g., “what are you gonna do about it?” or “can you tell him to stop” or “say stop”), but typically teachers took a noticeably more direct approach, especially in cases of more severe arguments or problems.

2/11/10: Debby is crying in the bathroom, repeating over and over, “she took something mine!” Rachelle (teacher) goes into the bathroom and asks Debby, “what’s up?” then she turns to the other girl and says, “that’s the second time today. What did you take? You can’t take that from her” as she takes the girl’s hand and pries out the paper towel that is balled in her hand, in which she finds a small pink plastic heart. She says, “you can’t take things, that’s not nice.” She gives the heart back to Debby.

Although these two incidents differ in tangible ways and are not a case-controlled comparison of reactions, they do highlight how response style differs across institutions. In other words, for the kinds of conflict that arise in these settings, the language used in their management differed by preschool, resulting in preschoolers witnessing distinct conflict management strategies.

Organizational Practice 2: Encouraging versus Discouraging the Decision-Maker Self

Preschools can also engage in classed socialization when staff members implicitly transmit messages about individuality and ownership. Preschoolers can be empowered as decision makers when they are treated as individuals and given control over what to do and when to do it; in contrast, lack of control over the timing and purpose of tasks and being treated as undifferentiated group members can discourage preschoolers from thinking of themselves as decision makers.

Teachers can approach preschoolers with the mindset that they are fundamentally unique individuals with unique situations, needs, or opinions. We argue that the more authority figures in preschool classrooms invoke individuality, they are transmitting messages that empower preschoolers to take responsibility for themselves, which in turn reifies the notion that one is, in general, a decision maker who exercises control. Note, for example, how Angela at University Tots emphasized Kenny’s individuality:

2/4/10: When Kenny is goofing off, putting his shirt over his head, Angela (teacher) says, “oh Kenny, I’d love to give you more crackers but I don’t think your body’s ready for them.” Kenny answers, “I want more crackers,” and Angela responds, “well is your body ready?” Kenny stops pulling his shirt over his head and Angela serves him more crackers.

In contrast to how Angela reminds Kenny to reconsider how he could gain control of his situation, note how Louise at Head Start uses directives rather than prompts when Nick struggles in a similar situation:

2/16/10: Nick gets up from the table during snack and wants to play with the train. Louise (teacher) says, “no, Nick, sit down. No train now.” Nick yells. Louise responds: “You can scream but it’s not gonna change it. Nick—no! Come sit down.”

Another way in which Head Start deemphasized individuality was by highlighting how students belonged to preassigned groups. Here for example, Louise at Head Start reminded Delilah that she is a girl first and must do as girls do, regardless of what Delilah wants to do:

3/9/10: Delilah runs after the boys as they’re leaving the bathroom (the girls have not been dismissed yet) and Louise says to her, “Delilah, Delilah, you have to wait with the girls.” Delilah replies, “I want to tell Ian something.” Louise says, “okay, you can tell him later, when the girls are done. You have to wait for the girls.”

One of the most striking ways in which preschoolers at these two preschools were treated as unique individuals versus members of a group involved teacher-student interactions around bathroom use. At Head Start, all preschoolers were directed by authority figures to go to the bathroom together as a class. The bathrooms had multiple stalls, all the kids went at once, and the teachers made the decision as to when the class would go to the bathrooms. When the class went to the bathrooms, everyone had to go to the bathrooms and/or try.

2/24/10: When we are at the bathroom Rachelle (teacher) says, “everyone’s gotta use the restroom because we’re not coming back for a while.” She repeats this two or three times.

3/2/10: The class goes to the bathroom, lining up at the door like always and then walking up the hallway to the boys’ and girls’ bathrooms. Today, even those preschoolers that went to the bathroom just two minutes ago go to the bathroom when the class goes as a whole group. When Ian complains that he doesn’t have to go to the bathroom (because he was one of the preschoolers that went two minutes before), Louise (teacher) says to him, “I know, you don’t have to go, you just have to wait here.” [at the bathrooms]

If a preschooler needed to go to the restroom in between these class trips they had to ask a teacher to take them, and it prompted a group offer, sometimes interrupting the rest of the class and stopping activities early to turn the individual request into a group trip to the restrooms.

2/11/10: Melissa says, “I need to go potty.” Rachelle (teacher) responds, “you need to go potty?” Melissa says, “uh-huh.” Rachelle responds, “okay, anyone else need to go potty?”

2/24/10: Bill has to go to the bathroom (he tells me, and I tell Tiffany [teacher]), and when Tiffany tells Rachelle (teacher) she is taking Bill to the restroom, a number of other preschoolers say that they have to go too, so Tiffany has the whole class line up to go to the bathroom together. When kids are taking a while to line up Tiffany says, “come on guys, let’s line up cause Bill’s gotta go right, right now.” To those preschoolers who are trying to express a wish to clean up or finish the thing they are doing (writing in journal, etc.) she tells them that they can finish what they’re doing when they get back from the bathroom.

At University Tots, two individual bathrooms with doors were accessible through the cubby room. Preschoolers were instructed to go one or two at a time. When the whole class needed to go to the bathroom at the same time (e.g., before going outside or eating lunch) a teacher would send them in one at a time by calling their names and sending them to one toilet or the other. Otherwise, the teachers kept track mentally of who went when, and asked preschoolers individually on a regular basis (about every hour) if they needed to go to the bathroom or asked them to try. Depending on the preschooler, teachers asked preschoolers if they need to go to the bathroom and respected a yes or no answer, or they asked the preschooler if they would like to go now or in a few minutes. ⁷ Only a couple times during the observation period did a teacher insist that a preschooler use the bathroom at a particular time, and in all of these cases the preschooler was just becoming potty trained and was directed to go when he woke up from nap to prevent an accident.

2/10/10: Charlotte (teacher) says to Ruby (teacher), “Jeff just went potty, and now Maddie’s going.” To Suzanne she says, “do you need to go potty, or are you okay?” Suzanne answers, “I’m okay.” Charlotte says, “okay. Alexis . . . Alexis? Would you like to go potty now or in two minutes?” Alexis says, “two minutes” Charlotte answers, “okay, Carl, would you like to go potty now or in two minutes?” Carl says, “two minutes.” Charlotte answers, “okay.”

Bathroom use is significant because controlling when a preschooler goes to the restroom is exerting control over one of the most basic bodily functions, and a core aspect of early socialization (Millei and Cliff 2014). Thus, when Head Start teachers directed their classrooms to use the bathroom as a group, they were sending their preschoolers the message that their bodies must conform to a uniform schedule. In contrast, University Tots teachers’ strategy of sending preschoolers one by one and keeping track of the preschoolers’ individual schedules sent the message to the preschoolers that their needs were unique and taught them to take responsibility and leave a game or activity to attend to their bodily needs as necessary.

We acknowledge that this way of exercising authority with regard to bathroom management is likely due in part to the physical bathroom configuration. But we also contend that treating preschoolers as individuals as opposed to members of a group is a consistent theme at University Tots. For example, Head Start preschoolers were routinely divided into “learning centers” on the basis of age and other factors and also grouped by their chores for the day (e.g., table setters did their job while everyone else participated in “circle time”). This arbitrary division told preschoolers that they could be controlled via group membership assigned by powers outside of their control. At University Tots, however, the only time the class was split into distinct groups was when half the class went outside to play and half stayed in, and this was determined by a combination of preschoolers’ own preferences and whether they had snow clothing (see below for more details). Otherwise, students at University Tots were never grouped by teachers during the observation period, such as by gender or assignment; the only way students were observed being divided into groups was through self-selection:

1/27/10: At the end of snack time, Charlotte (teacher) says to the children remaining at the snack table, “so what I would like you to do, if you’re excused—are you going to do the cake?” The kids at the table all nod “yes.” Charlotte continues, “then please stay right where you are.”

By addressing and treating the preschoolers as a group, the teachers at Head Start were sending the message to the preschoolers that they were first and foremost part of a larger group and constrained to the parameters and rules of the whole group. By contrast, the teachers at University Tots, by addressing preschoolers more as individuals than groups, taught their preschoolers to view preschool as an institution that served their individual, distinctive needs.

Beyond group versus individual orientation, organizational practices regarding the pace and purpose of daily activities can also encourage or discourage preschoolers to think of themselves as decision makers. Staff members at both preschools exercised the authority to structure activities and the pace of the school day, but once again, stark classroom differences were observed in terms of the agency and voice given to the preschoolers.

At Head Start the teachers announced the beginning and end of activities, with the exception of clean up time, which a preschooler announced at a teacher’s direction. Otherwise, the schedule and pace of the day at Head Start exemplified external control because what the class would do when was predetermined and out of the control of the preschoolers:

2/11/10: One preschooler says, “after we go to the bathroom we’re gonna go outside.” Tiffany (teacher) replies, “no, we’re gonna do circle first.”

2/11/10: Debby and Matthew are goofing off so Tiffany (teacher) says to them, “Debby and Matthew, stop. Stop. Sientate, por favor.” Rachelle (teacher) adds, “okay we have to sit down. Here, Matthew and Debby, sit, sit.” And she places them in chairs. Then she says to them, “every day we have to do the same thing.” (emphasis added)

Similarly, on two occasions in each preschool during the observation period, teachers held votes for the preschoolers to decide between two activity choices, but the way that teachers responded to the results of the votes differed between classrooms in notable ways. At Head Start, the results of observed votes were roughly estimated, and teachers ended up making the final decision, even going against the majority choice in one notable instance:

3/16/10: After they finish the book, Louise (teacher) asks if they want to go outside before doing circle, or if they want to do circle first. The kids vote unanimously for going outside first. But then a single preschooler wants to do “groups” [used as a noun for group activity time]. Louise then says, “okay, let’s do a short ‘groups.’”

This authority-controlled daily schedule contrasted starkly with the flexibility and negotiation rights given to preschoolers at University Tots regarding scheduling. The teachers at University Tots did determine the beginning and end of some activities almost exclusively (e.g., clean-up time, meals, nap time), but the invitation given to their preschoolers to participate in decision making was palpably different:

1/27/10: Charlotte (teacher) announces to the whole class, “All the kids are gonna go in so let’s put our toys away.” Some kids protest, so Charlotte says, “okay, wanna do it now or in five minutes?” A preschooler says, “five minutes,” so Charlotte says, “okay five minutes.”

In contrast to what was observed at Head Start, teachers at University Tots honored the results of the two votes that took place during the observation period. For one vote held, the votes were carefully counted out loud, the winning decision announced, and the winning choice honored. For the other vote, there was a tie and teachers were thus invited to participate in the vote to break the tie. The following example demonstrates how preschoolers at University Tots were given the message that their individual vote counted:

1/27/10: Charlotte asks the class, “do you guys wanna go outside or stay inside?” there is a cacophony of noise, so Meredith goes around the room asking the kids one by one, taking a vote. The result of the vote is to go outside, and when a couple kids protest, Charlotte turns off the lights and says, “okay, I understand that some people want to stay in, but most want to go out, and we need to stay all together as a class because we’re nine [students], so we’re gonna go out for a while. And it’s good for us, and we’re tough [State] kids!” The kids repeat, “yeah, we’re tough [State] kids!” ⁸

When teachers did make executive decisions around scheduling, it was typically framed as decision directly dictated by student needs:

1/26/10: Kids start to get very talkative, so Charlotte (teacher) says, “I think we need to go outside and make noise. Can you all go to your cubbies and make noise all the way there?”

In addition to observing differences in the scheduling of activities, we note clear differences in how the activities themselves were managed and success evaluated. At Head Start, who participated in which activity was most often dictated by a teacher:

3/10/10: After the book Tiffany (teacher) says, “alright, we’re gonna choose our areas.” She asks Rachelle (teacher) to put the papers with the stickers on them out on the tables, then to the kids she says, “see these lists? That’s what color you’ll get, depending on what list you’re on.” Then she calls the kids’ names one by one, handing the appropriately colored sticker to each as they stand to respond to her summons. When each preschooler gets their sticker they find their correct table.

Furthermore, a student’s participation in an activity was evaluated by teachers as successful if the preschooler followed the rules and completed projects “correctly”:

2/9/10: Tiffany (teacher) is facilitating the art table and says, “what we’re going to do to make our magic crayon pictures is we’re gonna put whatever colors we want all over a piece of paper” . . . She then adds, “this is what you have to do—you have to put whatever colors all over the paper. Fill it up with lots of color.” Irene holds up her drawing and says, I’m done.” Tiffany looks over and says, “let me see the colors you used” and takes the drawing. Then she adds, “you know what, if you fill it all the way up with color, your magic crayon picture will be much better. Fill it all up, put more color on there.” Irene answers, “I did,” and Tiffany replies, “I still see white. Fill it all the way in. More color, more color.”

3/17/10: Rachelle gives a marker to each preschooler, saying, “Okay, I want you to draw a picture of yourself, your face, and your eyes, and your nose, and your mouth, and your body . . .” Amanda tells her she is drawing herself with one eye. Rachelle says, “you have to draw two eyes ’cause you’re drawing you and you have two eyes.”

Even teachers were subject to the set pace of some activities in the Head Start classroom. During story time, most books at Head Start were listened to on prerecorded CD while the teachers flipped the pages and showed the pictures in time with the recording. In this case, the CD player set the pace of the activity for students and teachers alike.

In contrast, at University Tots activities were managed in ways that aligned with the logic of internal control. For example, teachers never used a CD for story time and instead always read the book themselves during the period of observation, often interrupting themselves to ask the class questions. In this way, story time became an activity in which preschoolers were invited to share their opinions and hence an activity in which preschoolers could exercise control over the pace of the story.

1/26/10: Before starting the book, Charlotte (teacher) prefaces it with an explanation (this is a story about a family, a girl Frances and her mommy and her daddy and her sister, and she’s supposed to be going to bed . . .). About halfway through the book Charlotte stops to discuss the pictures (“what kind of look is that? Happy? No! Confused? I think it looks like a scared look). Linda (teacher) also added commentary (example: “you know what I think, Charlotte? I think she doesn’t want to go to bed!”) They stop to talk about what they hear at night, prompted by John saying to Linda, “I hear noises at night at my house.”

In general, activities at University Tots were directly supervised by teachers as they were at Head Start, but teachers at University Tots would routinely ask their preschoolers to define the activities for themselves by asking questions such as, “what is that?” or “can you tell me what you’re doing?”

1/28/10: Kenny says to Charlotte (teacher), “Look at this” (pointing at the magnet blocks that he is playing with) Charlotte says, “tell me about it.” Kenny tells her, “it’s a house you live in.” Charlotte repeats, “It’s a house you live in? What happens in that part of the house?” (pointing to one part of the house). They continue to talk about the house.

Also, it was clearly observed that preschoolers at University Tots were encouraged to participate in decision making with regard to activity selection. University Tots teachers encouraged and supported preschooler-initiated activities, and teacher-initiated activities came in the form of offers or suggestions motivated by student needs.

1/26/10: John says to Linda (teacher): “I wanna do a puzzle.” Linda responds, “okay you can do that.” [preschooler initiating activity] and then Linda says to another preschooler, “can you help me with a puzzle?” [teacher initiating activity].

1/28/10: The teachers discuss whether they should go outside to play or not. The teachers decide that those who want to go outside can go out, those who want to stay in will stay in, and they tell this to the class, saying they will figure out who’s going out and staying in once everyone’s in their cubbies. John gets upset about going outside, and Charlotte (teacher) says to him, “listen to my words. I’m not making you go outside, I just want you to go sit in your cubby.” Once the kids are sitting in their cubbies the teachers put jackets, mittens, and hats on those preschoolers who want to go outside, and those who wish to remain inside go back into the classroom to play.

In sum, although there was a mixture of approaches used in each school, teachers at University Tots addressed preschoolers more often as individuals and framed activities as opportunities for preschoolers to exercise some control over their bodies and minds, thus encouraging independent thought and creativity. In the Head Start environment, preschoolers were more often treated as members of assigned groups and were implicitly and explicitly praised for following direction and doing activities “correctly.”

Organizational Practice 3: Framing the Nature and Role of Higher Authorities

Both preschools were guided by state and company rules, but we observed notable differences in (1) how staff members portrayed organizational rules to the preschoolers, (2) the extent to which staff members behaved as if they had power vis-à-vis higher authorities, and (3) to whom staff members themselves deferred, implicitly or explicitly. We argue that preschoolers at both institutions were taught to understand that teachers were the boss of preschoolers and that even higher authorities were the boss of teachers. Schools, however, differed markedly in how they conceptualized for preschoolers the relational distance of these roles and the origins of local, organizational rules.

At Head Start, teachers made it clear to preschoolers that ‘the buck stops’ with an anonymous and unapproachable higher power located outside of the individuals who worked at the organization. They did so, for example, by not explaining why the daily rules of their preschool lives had become rules in the first place and instead invoking phrases that conveyed blanket subordinate status, such as “we’re not allowed to” and “they don’t let us.”

2/9/10: When a preschooler asks a teacher why their cubby name tags have been changed (they used to have a picture of the preschooler with their name written below, and now there is just the written name) the teacher replies that they had to change them because they were allowed to have a name or a picture but they were not allowed to have both, so she decided to go with the names.

2/23/10: One preschooler suggests taping a ripped library book back together and Rachelle (teacher) replies, “they don’t want us to tape them, remember?”

By contrast, at University Tots, teachers portrayed organizational rules as traceable to organizational agents who were visible and accessible by first name in daily life, such as teachers and directors. The reasons for the rules were typically explained along with the declaration of the rule (e.g., “we don’t do that because it’s not safe”). We observed, for example, how the director of University Tots was asked for clarification in a situation, modeling for preschoolers how one can ask for permission in bureaucratic settings to work around existing rules or conditions:

1/26/10: When Charlotte (teacher) comes in, Christopher approaches her and asks her something, pointing to a train he is holding in his hand. Charlotte does not understand and says, “uh, how are you gonna do that?” After Christopher tries to explain a few more times, Charlotte asks for a translation from Linda (teacher). Linda explains that he is looking for more trains for the train set, at which Charlotte directs him to Janet (director), and they go downstairs to look. They come back with a box of other types of trains and cars.

By asking the director about the rules, not using an anonymous “they” in reference to rules, and linking rules to reasons, the teachers at University Tots portrayed to the preschoolers an image of internal control over the classroom and preschool by visible, tangible people who could be accessed and appealed to. In contrast, the anonymous “they” and lack of explanation for rules provided at Head Start created an image of an inaccessible, higher power that exerted control over the classroom rules from afar. ⁹

In doing so, staff members at each school modeled different behavior for preschoolers in terms of how much power people had vis-à-vis higher authority. This was strikingly clear in terms of how teachers portrayed their role to students vis-à-vis the curriculum. Both preschools had curricula to guide and organize their teaching activities, but teachers’ relationships to these curricula differed substantially. Teachers at Head Start followed a standardized Head Start curriculum that they treated as a fixed set of “marching orders.” Teachers viewed themselves as beholden to this curriculum, as was plainly evident through their documentation practices, a point we elaborate on below.

2/9/10: After the preschoolers have left, Rachelle (teacher) shows me that she takes notes based on a “creative curriculum” development model, and must make note of every time that preschoolers exhibit/learn one of the skills listed in the handbook.

By contrast, the curriculum represented soft guidelines at University Tots as opposed to hard rules. As one teacher explained, “we don’t know what the curriculum is going to be until we do it.” More precisely, staff members told us that they followed a general schedule of incorporating music, cooking, walks, and show-and-tell each week, and they followed a general curriculum of incorporating a number of philosophies into teaching—that is, how they learn was written, but what they learn was not. Unlike at Head Start, staff members at University Tots openly embraced the notion of the curriculum being shaped by the preschoolers themselves. For example, the train unit observed was explained as the outgrowth of preschoolers’ expressions of interest in trains. About halfway through the observation period, they switched focus and began a section on rocks because the kids had expressed interest in rocks. This led to reading stories about stones and rocks (e.g., the Stone Soup story) and taking a field trip to look at and discuss buildings that were made out of different types of rocks. Overall, the curriculum at University Tots is best described as flexible, organic, and spontaneous:

1/29/10: Linda (teacher) is reading a book (Stone Soup), and Linda says to Charlotte (teacher), “this could be a good idea for curriculum! Later that day during circle they do end up acting out the story even though the activity was not originally planned.

1/27/10: [Charlotte is asking John about the animals that he is playing with] Charlotte then says, “What’s that one? Is that an orangutan? I’m not sure what that animal is . . .” She then goes downstairs for a book to look up the proper name for the animal and returns a few minutes later with an armful of books about animals. When they return: Charlotte brings up the books on animals and says, “we thought we found some interesting ones” to Meredith (teacher), and then to the preschoolers she says, “here are some books about animals” and almost all the kids come running over to get one.

Another vehicle through which staff members taught hierarchy was through documentation practices. Both preschools kept documentation on preschooler progress, but at Head Start, record keeping was intensive and explicitly conceptualized as a task completed in service of the state and Head Start, as opposed to being for the preschoolers or their parents. Note-taking regularly interrupted preschoolers in their play and work and was both overt and pervasive throughout daily activities, including during “centers,” organized activities, free playtime on the playground, free playtime in the classroom, snack time, circle, and more.

2/23/10: During centers Rachelle (teacher) is leading a group of preschoolers in a guessing game, letting them feel an object hidden in a bag, and guess what the object is. After each preschooler’s turn she writes down in her notes what they guessed, and after all the preschoolers have made a guess, she takes the object out of the bag and shows them what it was. Rachelle takes extensive notes during this activity, speaking out loud, repeating what she is writing down (“Ivy thought it was a frog because it had legs, and Bill . . .”). At one point she asks students to pause so she can finish writing before they continue the game.

Even artwork was documented before it could be taken from the building.

3/16/10: When a preschooler asks for her paper number project back, Tiffany (teacher) says, “You know what? We need to take a picture of it, but then I’ll give it back to you—put it in your cubby” [to take home].

In this way, the organizational practice of documentation at Head Start—akin to a form of surveillance—implicitly sent the message to preschoolers that even teachers were controlled by the anonymous and inaccessible “they.” This practice aligns with an external form of control because it implied that an array of higher, invisible powers were tracking the preschoolers’ progress, as opposed to a more internal control approach in which the preschoolers (and their parents) were responsible for their own success.

Thus, a core difference between Head Start and University Tots is that record keeping in the latter context was presented to preschoolers as a part of organizational life that served parents and preschoolers themselves. No instances of note-taking for the state were observed. Rather, record-keeping served the purpose of notifying parents of their preschoolers’ achievements. Whenever preschoolers completed an artistic or creative project, teachers directed them to put it in their cubby, to be taken home at the end of the day. In this way, not only did University Tots teachers lead their classrooms as if they had more autonomy from the state and over the curriculum compared with Head Start teachers, University Tots teachers also recognized the authority of parents. Because parents are advocates of an individual child, we argue that documentation practices at University Tots reified the notion that preschoolers are unique individuals.

Although it is unlikely that preschoolers could articulate their awareness of note-taking practices simply given their age, behavioral observations strongly suggest that University Tots preschoolers were, for example, actively encouraged and taught that they were responsible for reporting on their own learning and progress to their parents.

2/10/10: Following a private conversation between Carl and Charlotte (teacher), Charlotte turns and announces to the rest of the class, “hey guys, you know what Carl is going to tell his mom when she picks him up? [He told me that] he’s going to say ‘we went to Preston Hall and we saw dinosaur bones.’”

2/8/10: Linda (teacher) says to Anthony (in voice meant for his mom to hear and listen), “Anthony, can you show your mommy how to say, ‘I love you’ in sign language? Thumb, pointer, and pinkie.” He does it and shows his mom.

In addition, parent-teacher relations as observed during pick up and drop off reinforced the message to preschoolers at University Tots that teachers recognized the authority of parents. ¹⁰ At Head Start, in contrast, most parents stayed only long enough to drop off or pick up their children and sign them in or out on the computer.

2/11/10: The parents go to the computer to check in as their kids run off to begin their chores. Some of the parents call out “bye” to their children when they leave, others give a hug, and some just leave. They do not talk with the teachers more than a word or two. Tiffany calls out “bye—have a good afternoon” to a couple of parents.

But at University Tots parents typically stayed for at least 5 minutes, more often 10 to 30 minutes, especially at pick-up time.

2/3/10, pick-up: Maddie’s mom and dad arrive. Her mom talks with the teachers while her dad goes to Maddie. Her mom and dad both talk with Charlotte (teacher) while standing next to Maddie, who is swinging on the tire swing (around 10-15 minutes). Christopher’s dad arrives, holds Christopher while talking with Charlotte for a while about Christopher’s potty use (around 7 minutes).

In fact, when a parent stayed for less time (e.g., when Maddie’s mom had to run off to a meeting and could not stay to help Maddie get her coat off), it usually prompted explanation.

Topic of conversation in teacher-parent interactions also differed between the classrooms. At University Tots, parent-teacher conversations covered a range of topics, often not about the preschool student directly (e.g., the weather, or common interests and experiences), modeling a casual and amicable relationship of equals. In contrast, parent-teacher conversations at Head Start almost always revolved around reporting on the preschooler (e.g., the preschooler’s health or behavior), with the exception of notable instances of conversations about funding assistance. ¹¹ This modeled a more formal and hierarchical relationship in which teachers play the role of institutional agents and community resources.

3/10/10: A student’s mom talks to a teacher in the hall, asking for help with qualifying for some financial assistance. The teacher asks for her income, the number of people in her household, and a copy of her driver’s license. This is a similar conversation to one I observed between another student’s parent and a teacher a few days ago.

Finally, we note that differences in building access align tightly with our argument that parents played different roles in the implicit hierarchy taught at each preschool. At Head Start, the door was locked and the teachers put out a doorbell when the school day started. Parents could access the building only by ringing the doorbell and being let in by a teacher. Teachers and administrators were the only ones with keys to the building. This means that teachers had full control over parent and preschooler access to the building.

At University Tots, the door had a code lock on it, and each parent had a code to open the door during school hours. Thus, parents had far more control over their own access to the building. Although ultimately the teachers still had control over when parents could enter the building and who was allowed in (i.e., who was given the code), these two different methods of allowing access created two very different images for the preschoolers. Preschoolers either saw the teachers opening the door for the parents, letting them in, and exerting control over their physical entrance into the classroom, or they saw their parents entering the building of their own accord. All these aspects of parent-teacher relations—time spent together, conversation subject matter, building access—transmit implicit messages to preschoolers about hierarchy. The message sent by University Tots was that parents and teachers were equal and in cooperation with one another regarding the preschooler’s education, and that the preschooler and teacher should have a cooperative relationship as well. The message sent by Head Start was that teachers are authorities that parents must defer to, and that the preschooler should do the same.

Discussion and Conclusion

In this study we explore how status socialization proceeds in one Head Start classroom versus one tuition-charging classroom. We find evidence to suggest that even at the preschool level—when the overt curriculum, such as learning the alphabet, is relatively straightforward—there are numerous ways in which lessons about status positioning and control can become embedded in institutional routines. Specifically, we pointed to three organizational practices that transmit messages about the status position preschoolers occupy in the broader hierarchy in which people at large are embedded.

First, we observed teachers in both classrooms directly modeling classed authority relations via teacher-student relations. In the Head Start classroom, teachers were more likely to play the role of “boss” to their students, whereas in the University Tots classroom, teachers styled themselves as personal guides or trainers—simultaneously in charge while playing a support role. Second, we observed classroom management practices in each classroom that reinforced these implicit messages about authority relations. Daily practices and interactions that acknowledged individuality and encouraged preschoolers to take control of the pace and meaning of activities suggest that preschoolers in the University Tots classroom were steered toward taking control of themselves. Meanwhile, group orientation and teacher-controlled scheduling appeared to discourage agentic decision making among preschoolers in the Head Start classroom, emphasizing the hierarchical relationship between preschoolers, teachers, and higher powers. In the Head Start classroom, the schedule and pace of the day were dictated by the organization and enforced by teachers, whereas at University Tots, schedule and pace were treated as an aspect of daily life that could be the product of at least some preschooler-teacher negotiation.

Third, preschools’ routines transmitted implicit messages about who has control vis-à-vis higher authorities. The way in which the University Tots organization recognized parent authority in the classroom was more likely to signal to preschoolers their own fundamental importance. This contrasts sharply with how we observed higher authority to be conceptualized at Head Start, which we argue emphasized how preschoolers were lower in the pecking order than teachers, how teachers were lower in the order than the state and other broad (and anonymous) authorities, and that parents were somehow outside of these authority relations.

Given these findings, we recommend that future work on free preschool development include consideration of the hidden curriculum. Historically, Head Start and other free preschool programs have focused on developing strong overt curricula, with notable positive impacts on kindergarten readiness with regard to academic skills (Latham 2018; Reardon and Portilla 2016). The findings of this study demonstrate that equal attention should be given to the hidden curriculum in free preschool programs if the goal of these programs is to provide children from economically disadvantaged backgrounds with an equal chance of long-term academic success.

We recognize, however, that our research design limits our ability to make generalizable claims or causal claims regarding preschool hidden curricula. First, we recognize that had the observation period been longer by months or years, we would have observed a significantly larger sample of practices within each preschool. But regardless of sample size, we recognize that we cannot claim that something never occurs in a classroom just because we did not observe it happening during the observation window. Second, and more generally, we cannot pinpoint the extent to which other preschool classrooms serving children of these social class backgrounds feature the same logics of control or specific practices, or whether other preschool environments differ primarily by class (as these two classrooms did) rather than along other status characteristics, such as race. For example, we encourage future research to delve into how the gender and racial composition of the classroom may interact with teaching styles and the transmission of classed messages. The two classrooms in this study did differ by gender and racial composition, and we acknowledge that these compositional differences are an important part of an organization’s social fabric. At the same time, it is difficult for us to speculate how gender and racial composition matter in this particular study, as we have no analytical leverage to do so with only two preschools that vary simultaneously by the social class of their clientele. One way to address this issue would be to consider the extent and nature of within-institution change over time in teaching styles in conjunction with compositional changes in the gender and/or racial make-up of the student body.

Another important issue to address moving forward pertains to the proximal or distal forces that shaped the daily routines we observed in each school. That is, what explains why these practices emerged in each school? We cannot identify, for example, the extent to which observed practices are the result of classed individuals at various levels of the organization’s operations, or the product of an even deeper layer of institutional management (e.g., policy or legal design). Future research could examine representative samples of preschools to study their “organizational sagas” (Clark 1972), which includes their organizational structure, explicit mission statements, and implicit marketing and messaging about their practices and purpose. That said, the one explanation we believe can be ruled out is teacher personality. First, language and practices were largely consistent across teachers within each school setting during the observation period. For example, teachers at University Tots all used the phrase “your body” to note behavioral issues: “your body is telling me that you’re tired” (Charlotte); “I’d love to give you more crackers but I don’t think your body is ready for them” (Angela); “that’s why you have so many wiggles in your body, because you didn’t go outside and get your wiggles out” (Linda). Second, the bathroom structure, parental door access, and physical presence or absence of certain authority figures (e.g., the director) cannot be boiled down to teacher personality in each classroom. We suspect that the resource differences between these two preschools may partly explain why their practices differ and look forward to future investigations of the origins of practices that could follow up on this hunch.

Finally, further research is needed to understand the extent to which students and parents are internalizing the classed messages observed in this study. We did observe students and parents repeating phrases and practices modeled by teachers during the observation period, indicating shared practices on some level. But the ability of this study to draw conclusions about message absorption is limited by the study’s research design. We specifically encourage future empirical research to investigate if exposure to these practices leads to the adoption of different behaviors and worldviews in the long term.

If students and parents are internalizing the classed messages that are being sent by institutions, this could indeed be why Durkin et al. (2022) found that low–socioeconomic status (SES) students who attend free preschools actually do worse, on average, than comparable low-SES students who wanted to attend but who (mostly) stayed at home instead with family. ¹² Existing research on preschool disadvantage tends to focus on resource-based inequality, such as with respect to per-pupil funding (Friedman-Krauss et al. 2021) and teacher training and qualifications (Friedman-Krauss et al. 2021; Phillips et al. 2017). We note, however, that between-school resource inequality is unlikely the driving factor behind Durkin et al.’s (2022) findings, as they document that students attending free preschool fair worse over the long term than a control group who largely did not attend any other preschool program. Put differently, Durkin and colleagues’ results suggest that free preschools are organizations that (1) concretely help their students in the short term by preparing them for kindergarten academic subject matter but also (2) introduce something counterproductive to student success in the long term. Durkin et al. (2022) themselves suggest that researchers look deeper into “unconstrained” skill development in preschool settings, such as with respect to attention, working memory, and self-control. ¹³

To this point, we speculate that the status socialization practices observed at Head Start could be counterproductive to long-term academic success for low-SES students because it naturalizes or reinforces the idea at a very young age that (1) students are people who lack authority, and (2) the education system is rigidly hierarchical. Having such a mindset could suppress the development of an owner-activated and entrepreneurial attitude toward schooling—the attitude most rewarded within U.S. schools. In other words, compared with low-SES students who do not attend free preschools (i.e., the control group in Durkin et al. 2022) or compared with students exposed to a hidden curriculum that teaches an agentic approach to schooling (i.e., the comparison group in our study), students exposed to the kind of status socialization we identified in the Head Start hidden curriculum may be at a disadvantage when navigating mixed-class settings in the future. ¹⁴

In conclusion, although the “constrained” lessons learned in free preschools like counting and the alphabet help students to be more prepared academically for kindergarten in the short term, it could come at the cost of exposure to messaging that limits them in the long term. Whether this messaging is intentional or unintentional (Margolis 2001; Martin 1976; Vallance 1973), naming these practices is important, and here “a sociology of the local” (Fine 2010:355) provides grounded insights into the elusive process of soft-skills training. More broadly, identifying the relational principles underlying these three organizational practices is a concrete first step toward designing larger scale studies of hidden curricula.