Problem: Can this be made into a 4 minute script for a presentation?
In a quiet street in a largely Black, middle-class neighborhood in a major northeastern city stand large, old, stone houses with expansive porches and sweeping lawns. Alexander Williams lives in one such six-bedroom home. He is the only child of a middle-class African American couple. His parents, Christina Nile and Terry Williams, met when they were students at a small, predominantly white, religious college in the South. They had been married ten years before Alexander was born. Alexander's mother uses her maiden name, Christina Nile, at work, but she goes by Mrs. Williams at church. A tall woman with honey-colored skin, freckles, and long, black wavy hair, Ms. Williams is positive, bubbly, and energetic. She has a master's degree in liberal arts from an elite college and is a high-level manager in a major corporation. She has a corner office with a view, a personal secretary, and job responsibilities that include overseeing offices across the nation. She finds it hard to leave her office by six, since "that is when the West Coast is just getting warmed up." She knows she works fewer hours than she would if she didn't have Alexander. Although she tries to limit her travel to long days, she has an overnight trip at least once a month. Need Assignment Help?
Alexander's father, Terry Williams, is a tall, thin man, who stands very straight and has a serious demeanor. During the week, he is usually dressed in a formal dark suit, with a crisply ironed white shirt and a conservative tie. During family car trips, or while waiting for Alexander's events to begin, he is often absorbed by the newspaper, but he will occasionally join in the conversation and make wry jokes. He often calls Alex "Handsome" and ruffles his son's hair affectionately. Mr. Williams earned his J.D. degree from a well-regarded private university. A trial lawyer in a small firm, Mr. Williams works long hours handling (primarily) medical malpractice cases. Preparing these cases keeps him busy from five in the morning until midnight for two weeks each month. The other two weeks, he works until around 6 P.M.
The family, as Mr. Williams says, does not lack "creature comforts." Together, Mr. and Ms. Williams earn more than $200,000 annually. They rarely discuss money with their son; we never heard either parent say something was "too expensive." Their large, comfortable home is worth $150,000 in 1995; they drive a new beige Lexus; they have computers and portable phones; their son attends a private school. The Williamses' home is immaculately kept and expensively furnished. In the formal dining room, a long wooden table and tall, straight-backed chairs rest on a thick Oriental rug. A matching buffet stands nearby. The formal living room is always neat though rarely used, except for piano practice. The family spends most of its time in the large kitchen. They also sometimes sit in an upstairs family room decorated in a "country" theme. There are blue-and-white checked wingback chairs and a love seat, wreaths, wooden cats, an armoire-style entertainment center, and paintings with African and African American themes. The room also has a television. Occasionally Mr. Williams watches a basketball game; sometimes, the family watches The Cosby Show or Star Trek together.
Alexander is a tall, thin boy-a smaller edition of his father-with a winsome smile and a charming manner. He is active and inquisitive. One Saturday afternoon, for example, while the adults talk, he twirls around the kitchen. He keeps his hands on his stomach and pushes out the shirt of his soccer uniform as he circles. On another occasion, after his mother drops him off at the house and continues on to park the car, Alex hops off the steps and jumps up in the air, trying to see through the windows of the house. He is also verbally playful, initiating jokes and bantering with his parents. His mother, who stresses the importance of children being "exposed" to various experiences, is pleased with Alexander's approach to life:
I would have to say that Alexander is a joy. He's a gift to me. He's [a] very energetic, very curious, loving, caring person, that, um . . . is outgoing and who, uh, really loves to be with people and who loves to explore and loves to read and . . . just do a lot of fun things.
Alex is enrolled in after-school care on the school grounds of his private school, located near his mother's work.1 His mother, often accompanied by his father, picks him up at six in the evening. Alex is popular at school, a boy who "gets along with everybody." He initiates play with other children freely and easily. He is also busy in and outside of school. There are weekday evenings, especially near the end of the school year, when he does not get home until 9 P.M. In a typical week, Alexander attends a piano lesson, university choir practice, Sunday school, church choir, and baseball and soccer practice and/or games. He often has rehearsals linked to school plays and to concerts. In the winter, he plays basketball as well as indoor tennis. In the summer, he attends special sports camps.
Concerted Cultivation
Alex's parents fully support his involvement in extracurricular activities. Like other middle-class parents, they make accommodations in their own schedules to meet their son's needs. The Williamses' child-rearing strategy embraces the logic of concerted cultivation. They consider Alexander's many commitments an essential component in his overall development. In addition to the effects of concerted cultivation on the organization of daily life, concerted cultivation also shapes the use of language. Indeed, the extensive use of verbal negotiation is a pattern we observed in all of the middle-class homes and is a special focus of this chapter. It is an important part of middle-class parents' efforts to foster their children's talents and skills. In Alexander's home, as well as the homes of other middle-class children, there is a steady stream of speech, interrupted by periods of silence (as opposed to the pattern in working-class and poor homes, in which periods of silence are punctuated by speech). Talking fosters the development of children's knowledge and opinions. Middle-class children learn to articulate their own views as when, for example, in the opening to the chapter Ms. Williams encourages Alexander to prepare a question in advance for the doctor. Reasoning is also the mainstay of discipline and guidance in middle-class families. Finally, an emphasis on the use of reasoning in the home creates broad-spectrum benefits. Parent-child dialogues can boost children's vocabulary, preview or deepen knowledge of subjects taught in school, and familiarize children with the patterns of verbal interaction that characterize the classroom and other dealings with adults in organizational settings.2
The benefits of this aspect of concerted cultivation go beyond academic enrichment, however. Schools expect children to know how to reason with one another; doctors prefer informed patients who take responsibility for their health.3 Middle-class children, because they assume a position of mutuality or equality vis-à-vis adults, frequently pass judgment on the adults around them. Most of the middle-class parents we observed, including the Williamses, met such judgments with wry humor rather than anger. In general, the children of middle-class parents have a sense that they are special, that their opinions matter, and that adults should, as a matter of routine, adjust situations to meet children's wishes. Thus, one of the benefits of middle-class status appears to be the transmission of exceptional verbal skills that enable children to make special requests of adults in positions of power. This chapter provides examples of Alexander using his repertoire of reasoning skills with adults (his parents and his physician) to gain a customized advantage.4 These same skills, however, also can make family life exhausting, as children of all ages repeatedly seek to reason with their parents. The very same skills parents encourage in their children can and do lead children to challenge, and even reject, parental authority.
Throughout all their daily negotiations, Ms. Williams is alert for teachable moments. For example, as I show below, although distracted, she still manages to squeeze in a short math lesson while looking for her husband's car. As a result, Alexander is learning to be adept with language. This ability to use language instrumentally, that is, to use vocabulary along with reasoning and negotiating skills to achieve specific ends, is an important class-based advantage. Middle-class children, including Alexander, practice their nascent language skills to "customize" certain situations, and in so doing receive benefits.
Developing Alexander
Daily life in the Williams family owes much of its pace and rhythm to Alexander's schedule. Neither Alexander nor his parents consider his involvement in many different activities to be a problem. Mr. and Ms. Williams see their son's activities as a means of fostering his talents and skills. Alexander sees them as opportunities for fun and as ways to stave off boredom. He requests to be enrolled in certain activities and he initiates having friends come to the house to visit. Despite their number and variety, Alexander's commitments do not consume all of his free time. Still, as this section makes clear, his life is defined by a series of deadlines and schedules interwoven with a series of activities organized and controlled by adults, rather than by children.
Who is the child?
Name: Alexander Williams ?
He is an only child in a middle-class family to an African American couple.?
Alexander is a tall, thin boy who looks like a smaller version of his father. He has a winsome smile and a charming manner about him.?
He is active, inquisitive, energetic, very curious, loving, and caring. He loves being around people, exploring, reading, and doing fun things.?
In school, he freely and easily initiates play with other children. When he's not at school, he attends piano lessons, university choir practice, Sunday school, church choir, baseball, and soccer practice. ?
He attends rehearsals for school plays and concerts.?
During the winter, he plays basketball and indoor tennis.?
During the summer, he attends a special sports camp.?
Alex is well put together, maintains a structured schedule, and seems to freely move into new and enriching environments.?
What's the child's home like
The home is located in a major northeastern city. It's large, old, and made of stone. It has a huge porch and a sweeping lawn and contains six rooms in the house. ?
Their home is large and comfortable, and its estimated worth in 1995 was 150,000 dollars.?
The home was immaculately kept and expensively furnished. ?
Their dining room was formal and contained a long and tall wooden table with straight-backed chairs that lay atop a thick oriental rug. ?
The living room was kept neat and rarely used, except for piano practice. Rather than using the living room regularly, the family spent most of their time in the large kitchen. ?
The upstairs family room was decorated in a country theme. The room displayed blue-and-white checked wingback chairs and a love seat, wreaths, wooden cats, an armoire-style entertainment center, and paintings with African American themes. The room also contained a television that would be occasionally used to watch a basketball game or watch family shows together.?
Alexander's home life and the way it is setup represents the economic stability his parents provide for him. His household is clean, put together, and furnished with expensive items, signaling that the family is well off and structured in a way that allows Alex to thrive in his home environment. ?