sWs - 05 REFS ConcertedCultivation 2013q3

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Executive Summary:Memo to Texas RE: Alternative Education

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On-line Learning

C t B d C i l (CBC)

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Capacity Building as P.D.

Computer Based Curriculum (CBC) 7

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Concerted Cultivation

Best Practices In Alt Ed9

Legacy of Success: Pathfinders10

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Concerted cultivationFrom Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Concerted cultivation is a style of parenting that is marked by a parent's attempts to foster their child's talents through organized leisure activities. This parenting style is commonly exhibited in middle and upper class American families. Many have attributed cultural benefits to this form of child-rearing due to the style's use in higher income families, conversely affecting the social habitus of children raised in such a manner. A child that has been concertedly cultivated will often express greater social prowess in social situations involving formality or structure attributed to their increased experience in organized clubs, sports, musical groups as well as increased experience with adults and power structure. While this pattern of child rearing holds no innate positive qualities it has been linked to increased financial and academic success.

Negative considerations have included an overburdened sense of entitlement, lack of creativity, and the psychosomatic inability to play or relax, so advocates of Slow parenting prefer less management of childhood activities. None of these effects can be considered without broader cultural and economic considerations.

Concerted cultivation also emphasizes the use of reasoning skills and variations in language use. Parents start to encourage their children to learn how to speak with adults so that they become comfortable and understand the importance of eye contact and speaking properly at an earlier age. Concerted cultivation causes a transmission of differential advantages, meaning they end up having an advantage in life over children reared based on other methods. Children who are reared using the concerted cultivation method are set apart in academic environments and they also learn to have more confidence when confronted with social interactions.

Children start to form a certain sense of entitlement because of their early comfort with interacting with adults. Children also become more comfortable questioning adults and it is easier for them to see themselves as equals.[1] With concerted cultivation, the practices often infiltrate into the family life. Frequent gatherings provide opportunities for further cultivation such as eating at the dinner table together.[2]

Contents

1 Structured activities■2 Parenting 'practices' ■

2.1 Critical Overview■2.2 Natural Growth■2.3 Race Differences in Parenting■2.4 Inequality■

3 See also■4 References■

Structured activities

American middle class parents engage in concerted cultivation parenting by attempting to foster children's talents through organized leisure activities, which teach them to respect authority and how to interact in a structured environment[3]. Learning how to interact in a structured environment much like a classroom gives students a headstart in school because they are identified as intelligent or 'good' students. Other aspects of concerted cultivation include emphasis on reasoning skills and language use. Parents challenge their children to think critically and to speak properly and frequently, especially when interacting with adults. These skills also set the child apart in academic settings as well as give them confidence in social situations. By learning these traits, they are advancing themselves in their surroundings. Another difference is the involvement parents have in their children's lives. Parents are much more involved in following their children's academic progression. Through this process children from a concerted cultivation upbringing will feel more entitled in their academic endeavors and

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will feel more responsible because they know that their parents are highly involved. This sense of entitlement becomes important in institutional settings because American middle class children question adults and consider them relative equals.

Parenting 'practices'

In social stratification (a specific area of study in sociology) different parenting practices lead children to have different upbringings. Differences in child rearing are identified and associated with different social classes.

The two types of child rearing that are introduced[1] by Dr. Annette Lareau (sociologist and professor at the University of Pennsylvania) are concerted cultivation and natural growth. Concerted cultivation parenting is associated with those parents who have traditionally white collar jobs and those considered to be part of the middle class. Natural growth parenting is associated with blue collar workers of the working class. Parenting practices do not apply exclusively to social classes, but they are highly correlated[4]. She claims that the only defining factor as to how a child is raised is the amount of money that his or her parents have. There is not a complete correlation between money and child rearing practices; however, wealth and income are the most significant defining factors as to which child-rearing practice will be used.

Critical Overview

The techniques of child rearing that a parent uses when raising a child ultimately have a great effect on the child and how he or she develops. The difference between the two types presented by Annette Lareau is that concerted cultivation will in most cases provide a child with skills and advantages over natural growth children in the classroom and eventually in their careers. This is where parenting practices play into a larger social inequality issue. Social inequality results from a lack of educational and employment opportunities as well as the lower social status for the poor. This creates various difficulties for the poor and there are fewer opportunities to provide attentive care for their children. The natural growth parenting style arises under these disadvantaged circumstances. Natural growth is then perpetuated because these children will not be as well suited for the work force, and therefore, will make less money, and will most likely not be able to give their children a concerted cultivation upbringing. The critical issue is the difference in opportunities. Children of concerted cultivation, along with their upbringing, are typically provided with connections from their parents, friends, and activities that give them a step up in life. These advantages are perpetuated and inequality continues to exist.[5]

Natural Growth

Parents in the working class (and typically with lower incomes) engage their children in the accomplishment of natural growth. Children usually have more unstructured time and therefore create their own activities to occupy themselves. This environment does not prepare children to survive in settings that are very structured, such as schools.[6]. In working class households, the parents have less time to spend with children and do not have the money to hire help. Accompanying the strain on time, working class parents are left with less time to get involved with their children's schooling and activities, therefore they leave this up to the professionals. The parents do not do this on purpose but frequently have jobs that are less lenient with their hours and they have difficulties making it to meetings with teachers. This frequently leaves parents frustrated with a feeling of powerlessness and the children do not receive the sense of entitlement and support that comes with concerted cultivation. Having less time outside of jobs can also lead to less congruency between parents in their child-rearing practices. Having less consistency can cause the child to become more inhibited and reserved[7].

However, Natural Growth is comparable to Slow parenting, advocated by well-informed and financially stable parents who wish their children to be more independent and imaginative.



Race Differences in Parenting

Though there is evidence that race is linked to class, in parenting, race has a much lesser impact on a child's development than social class[8]. Social class, wealth, and income have a much more of an effect on what child rearing practices will be used, rather than the race of the parents or children. The correlation between race and social class comes from the perpetuated inequality in the distribution of wealth in America. The lack of money is the defining factor in the style of child rearing that is chosen, and minorities are more likely to have less wealth or assets available for use in their children's upbringing. Wealth and connections among middle class parents also defines how these children enter the labor market, with or without help in finding jobs[9].

Inequality

Inequality exists in the opportunities that lead to different child-rearing practices but they also cause many other differences, such as the quality of schools, as a result of differences in wealth, income, and assets. The schools in the wealthier neighborhoods have more money to hire better teachers, staff, and materials that improve education. In addition to having better teaching and materials, the schools have more money to make renovations, have a better appearance, and the children develop a sense of confidence and entitlement because they feel that they are learning in an environment of excellence. The quality of the parents work life varies dramatically as well, and this plays into how much time and energy parents have to spend engaging their children. If inequality was not such a powerful force in America, resources, funds, and schools would be distributed more evenly[10].

See also

Parenting■Hidden curriculum■Parenting styles■Slow parenting■Annette Lareau■Educational Inequality■Socialization■Helicopter parent■After-school activity■Soccer mom■

References

^ a b Lareau, Annette (2003), Unequal Childhoods, Berkeley: University of California Press, ISBN 0-520-23590-41.^ http://www.soc.washington.edu/users/brines/Social%20Class%20and%20Family%20Life.pdf2.^ Lareau 2003, pp. 11–123.^ Lareau 20034.^ Lareau 20035.^ Lareau 2003, pp. 14–326.^ Block, Jeanne H., Jack Block, and Andrea Morrison (2002) "Parental Agreement-Disagreement on Child-Rearing Orientations and Gender-Related Personality Correlates in Children." in Child Development 52: 965-974.

7.

^ Lareau, Annette (2002) "Invisible Inequality: Social Class and Childrearing in Black Families and White Families." in American Sociological Review. 67: 747-776.

8.

^ Lamont, Michele (2000) "Meaning-Making in Cultural Sociology: Broadening Our Agenda." in Contemporary Sociology. 29: 604.

9.

^ Lareau 2003, pp. 28–3210.

The book Outliers from Malcolm Gladwell in Chapter 4 discusses the concept of Concerted Cultivation.

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Retrieved from "http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Concerted_cultivation&oldid=454161795"



Appreciating “Concerted Cultivation” - thanks to Gladwell’s ‘Outliers’Posted in books, child development | June 12th, 2009

I used to criticize, and laugh at, at the way some Korean mommies schedule their children’s activities, study time, all-kinds of hagwon time… My few collection of books is pitiful compared to a typical Korean’s home library. I had this first taste of shock when I once visited the house of my son’s friend (they were 8 months that time) and I was greeted by a living room with floor to ceiling bookshelf FULL of children’s books. I asked, “Do you read all these to your baby?” Another friend explained that it was typical of a Korean home. I was dazed! I mean, even at 8 months my son loved browsing small books but never got into it for a long time. I never even dared to read to him for so long.

The grueling schedule of children can be so distressing to think about… at least, for me. When I finished reading the discussion on “Concerted Cultivation” in Malcolm Gladwell’s Outliers, I softened my criticism on the tendency of the Korean mothers to control their children’s schedule in the name of competitiveness. I am still not taken by the whole system. I still would not allow my son to go home at midnight from various hagwons for various after-school lessons in the name of competitiveness. Just this morning, one Korean mom I talked to admitted that most moms spend so much money for nothing. Anyway, this is not what this post is all about. But after reading about “concerted cultivation“, I have a new-found respect (not necessarily

admiration) for the Korean mom’s ways.

Malcolm Gladwell discussed the concept of “concerted cultivation” in his book “Outliers” as one of the advantages that outliers experienced while they were growing up. This concept was from a sociologist named Annette Lareau who described it as a “middle-class parenting style which attempts to actively foster and assess a child’s talents, opinions and skills“. Parents who use this parenting style “talked things through with their children, reasoning with them”. “They expected their children to talk back to them, to negotiate, to question adults in position of authority”. This parenting style also encourages providing a different sets of schedules to children, exposing them to constantly shifting set of experiences. Schedules would be good to children as this would give them an idea on how to “cope in highly-structured settings”. Korean children who

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adjust very well to their tight daily schedule would be good in this. They have an early start from this very early training. This is also actually the reason why I am convinced to bring my son to day school twice a week and I am contemplating on making it three times a week. His sense of schedule would be highlighted. For now, he has an idea that on Mondays and Thursdays he goes to school for two hours a day. Other days of the week are scheduled playgroups with different playmates. I say scheduled playgroup because we are lucky to be requested by different moms to have a playtime with my son. He is enjoying his playtime with these boys very much. Well, as they say, education is not limited to the four walls of the classroom:-).

Because of this parenting style, children would have a sense of “entitlement“. Annette Lareau has a positive definition of the term:

“They (children) acted as though they had a right to pursue their own indidvidual preferences and to actively manage interactions in institutional settings. They appeared comfortable in those settings; they were open to sharing information and asking for attention… It was common practice among middle-class children to shift interactions to suit their preferences.”

I would love to see my son having a sense of “entitlement” in a non-aggressive and non-confrontational manner. Lucky him he has a daddy to model after. He could learn a lot of negotiating skills from his Dad. I imagine I would end up exasperated from the negotiating table from the two of them.

At 31 months, he now knows what he wants and often bargains with me to get what he wants. That’s a good start. I can say, he is a free spirit! I have a non-Korean friend who has a number of times told me that I should control my son. The first time she said that, I was taken aback. Mothers just don’t say that to other mothers! Yes, compared to her son, my son could be described as “wild”. She has a good son who stands still upon hearing her raised voice. I learned my lesson a long time ago not to “try to show and prove to the other mommies around me that I discipline my son”. I could always do it in the privacy of our home. Not seeing me angry towards my son may have prompted her to comment like that. Upon sharing it to my husband, he just advised me to charge it to being “lost in translation”. She still keeps on seeking my son’s company for her son.

One thing that I wouldn’t want to destroy on my son’s personality is his free spirit. As long as he is not hurting others and does not do the hitting first, I let him manage on his own. That’s how he enjoys his childhood. That’s how he learns. And I believe, that’s how he will manage to bring himself to “shift interactions to suit his preferences”. Another thing that I tolerate is his frequent, and often, repetitive questions. I don’t want to kill his curiousity. I am sure most parents tolerate this from their own children. Being given answers to their questions, no matter how trivial, would give them a sense of “entitlement”. They would feel that they are entitled to ask and to be answered. This would encourage them to speak more confidently.

I don’t wish for my son to be a genius. I don’t wish for my son to have the highest academic honor but I do wish for him to be able to face all sorts of people with confidence. I don’t wish for him to have the highest IQ but I do wish for him to have social savvy. Gladwell calls it “practical intelligence“. It is a “set of skills that have to be learned. It has to come from somewhere, and the place where we seem to get these kinds of attitudes and skills is from our families”.

I just hope that hubby and I would be able to provide this kind of environment to our children.

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SHORT STORY: Concerted Cultivation is sometimes referred to as Differential Advantages The advantages ofreferred to as Differential Advantages. The advantages of the “upper strata” are compounded in a similar, but opposite way, just like low‐income students develop compounded negative responses to stresses.