SOCIAL CLASS AND CHILDREARING
Social class has a profound effect on interactions inside the home. Parents transmit advantages to children differently depending on class i.e. poor, working-class and middle-class. The effect of race was less felt than social class. Dissimilarity in a cultural logic of childrearing granted parents and their children a degree of difference in terms of resources to assist them in their day-day relations with people outside the home.
Regarding the use of language, children in middle class families more often than not take part in discussions that promotes logic and reconciliation. This can be seen in the conversation between Alex and his mother during the car ride home. For example, his mom asks him how his day was. This question gives Alex the chance to cultivate his verbal skills. Parents put a lot of emphasis in reasoning in middle-class homes and took views on different subjects from their children (Heath 1983). In contrast, in working class homes, majority of parents didn’t focus on advancing their children’s views but rather kept quiet when given information by their children. Hence children in working-class families do not have the chance of developing their thinking or language when at home compared to middle-class children. In addition, there is poor negotiation between children and their parents among the working-class. Children are given firm directives and cannot question their parents contrary to which they will be punished.
Middle-class children are rarely close to their extended families. For instance, Alexander doesn’t see his cousins more often nor play with neighborhood children. This is due to most homes in Alexander’s neighborhood being inhabited by couples without children. Majority of the children he plays with are from his classroom. In contrast, children in working-class families are closer to their extended families. These are considered important and dependable (Lareau 2000a).
The social class a family belongs to has a huge bearing on several aspects of family life for instance use of time, language and kin ties. Nevertheless, social class doesn’t affect all aspects of family life. In spite of everything, parents pass on advantages to their children more so the white and black middle-class families who have made a conscious effort to arouse children’s aptitude (Kohn and Schooler 1983). The working-class parents believe that the progress of their children will occur instinctively as long as they provide their children with reassurance food, shelter and other essential support. Variation in educational resources is also significant. The advanced level of education of middle-class parents offers them a wider pool of expressions and self assurance when overruling school matters. Working class parents do not recognize key terms and consider themselves socially superior to educators.
These diverse tactics bring out different results in children. Middle-class children as young as 9 years have been found to develop an apparent sense of their own abilities and skills. In adddition, they have made a distinction between themselves and their siblings and friends. Due to the importance placed on reasoning in middle-class families, children can utilize their way of thinking to convince adults to consent to their wishes. Also, middle-class families take children wants seriously. However, this steadfastness in developing children comes at a price. It results in crowded family calendar full of different acivities hence leaving little or no time for visiting extended families.
In working-class families, restrictions are set by the parents and children are open to fit their own routine within these restrictions. The actions of adults are not led by the children as common as in the middle-class and children are inferior to adults (Chidekel 2002). In working-class families there is no negotiation between children and parents. Parents usually hand out commands which are irreversible. In addition, children in working-class families experience a big divide between their family and the rest of the world due to lack of contact with strangers. The only contact they experience is with relatives.
In conclusion, childrearing across different social-classes has long-term consequences. Middle-class child rearing has a number of shortcomings. First, it is exhaustive due to exhaustive mothering and tight family timetables (Hays 1996). Secondly, children depend on their parents more compared to children in working-class families hence are less likely to stand on their own.
References
Chidekel, Dana. 2002. Parents in Charge. New York: Simon and Schuster.
Lareau, Annette. 2000a. Home Advantage: Social Class and Parental Intervention in Elementary
Education. 2nd ed. Lanham,MD: Rowman and Litlefield.
Hays, Sharon. 1996. The Cultural Contradictions of Motherhood. New Haven, CT: Yale
University Press.
Heath, Shirley Brice. 1983. Ways with words. London, England: Cambridge University Press.
Hochschild, Arlie Rusell. 1989. The second Shift: Working Parents and the Revolution at Home. New York: Viking.
Kohn, Melvin and Carmi Schooler, eds.1983. Work and Personality: An Inquiry into the Impact
of Social Stratification. Norwood, NJ: Ablex.
