Social Control and the Extracurriculum

Abstract

Drawing on a study of three South Australian schools, this paper traces a perceived decline in extracurricular activities to the invalidity of the functionalist rationale for the existence of such activities. It is contended that the development of the extracurriculum has been seen by teachers as a method of integrating the school and community, a method which does not threaten the core business of the school with interference by lay people. Further it is suggested that teachers have become disenchanted with the proposition that the extracurriculum would serve to inculcate values deemed necessary for the maintenance of social order: team-work, co-operativeness, future time orientation, deferred gratification, and the constructive use of leisure time. The contradictions between school and community on the one hand, and education for work and for leisure on the other, have produced a decline in the extracurriculum and the integration of many erstwhile extracurricular activities with the formal curriculum in an effort to achieve social and ideological integration of school and community.