The hidden curriculum in primary schools and the stress perception of primary school students created by the hidden curriculum

The aim of this research is to determine the positive and negative features of hidden curriculum at schools determined according to their socio-economical status and to determine the stress level on students created by those negative features. In the research, the primary schools in central of Kilis province were chosen as the field of the study and the exploratory research design was utilized. After getting necessary data from the Provincial Directorate of National Education, three schools were selected according to their socio-economic levels, which are low, middle and high, and interviews and observation, which form the qualitative aspect of the research, were conducted. To determine the features of hidden curriculum, ?In-class Observation Outline?, ?Teacher Interview Questions? and ?Student Interview Questions? ? were devised by the researcher. The 5 point likert scale was devised and implemented in order to determine stress levels of primary school students created by hidden curriculum. The qualitative aspect of the research included the observed classrooms and interviewed teachers and students. The quantitative aspect contains both 510 students who were given the pilot study and 469 students from 6, 7 and 8 grades, who were given the scales in order to determine the stress levels of students created by the hidden curriculum, and the total number of the students in the research was 979.The qualitative data in the research was analyzed in Nvivo 8 program and quantitative data was analyzed in SPSS 17 program. According to the results of the research, it was observed that the negative features of the hidden curriculum are common in schools from low and middle socio-economic background and problems generated from students are more common; on the other hand, in school from high socio-economic background, the frequency values of the features of the hidden curriculum are close to each other and hidden curriculum negative features generated from teacher are more common than features generated from students. According to the stress level created by the hidden curriculum of the opportunity of administrators school sub-dimension caused intermediate level of stress of student; other sub-dimensions caused less-level stress in the sub-dimension of ?Student? and ?Teacher?. The stress levels of students created by the hidden curriculum changed meaningly in terms of variables school, class, gender, occupation of father, number of siblings, education level of parents and level of income. Key terms: Hidden Curriculum, Stress, Primary Schools, Socio-Economic Level