Garrett Tallinger, a fourth grader, life is evolved around organized activities. The Tallinger’s are a family of the middle class, who seem to believe that organized activities shape their children’s life, and will create structure for their children as they grow up. In the home of the Tallinger’s, Garrett’s schedule dictates what the family will have planned for the day, they have very little time for extra- curricular activities. Which means, if Garrett’s siblings have something they need to attend to they more than likely won’t because Garrett has something going on that same day. The Tallinger’s rarely interact with their extended family because, of the busy life of Garrett. In Lareau’s opinion, organized activities are good for children in that they give the ability to be structured, they often get a head start on maturity and can help prepare children for performance- based assessment at school. Being a part of organized activities help children like Garrett acquire a basic job skill, the ability to work smoothly with acquaintances (Lareau,62). For Garrett Tallinger, Lareau concludes that his everyday experiences he acquires very important life skills, and have more of the opportunity to practice these …show more content…
Katie’s mother is currently unemployed. Like Tyrec Taylor, Katie Brindle does not engage in organized activities. Katie plays with neighborhood children in the large parking lot of the Brindles’ apartment building (Lareau,86). At such a young age, Katie has endured life altering experiences. When Katie was in the first grade she had been sexually molested, when Katie was in the third- grade she missed quite a bit of school. She was hospitalized in a program part due to her displays of self- destructive behavior (Lareau,87). In Katie’s everyday life there are few interactions with African-Americans. The neighborhood in which she lives in is overwhelmingly white. For Katie and her family, the lack of economic resources makes almost every aspect of daily life more complicated and stressful than it is for middle-class or even working-class families. For the Brindle family, simple life tasks were harder to accomplish. Lareau notes that, when she began the study she expected to find marked differences in child-rearing strategies between poor and working-class families. This turned out to not be true. For Tyrec Taylor and Katie Brindle their life was not controlled by organized activities, which made things easier for them and for their parents. They appeared to be more relaxed and vibrant