Today, in approximately 95 million middle-class American households, the idea that you can pick up the phone on a Friday afternoon and invite a friend over for dinner is foreign. It is completely foreign to the idea that a family can plan to share quality time with friends and extended family without two to four weeks' notice. However, in the 200 million working class and poverty level households, the idea of ​​not being able to make those last minute plans is a foreign thought. Parenting styles in these American homes are what Annette Lareau addresses in “Unequal Childhoods: Class, Race and Family Life”. Based on my experience and other evidence, Lareau's argument that middle- and upper-class parents use concerted cultivation and working-class parents use natural growth is accurate because our personal calendars of events don't lie. a brother or sister. Neither of my parents had a high school education and both worked an average of 45 to 50 hours a week to support the family. During my four years of high school, I don't remember my mother asking me about an assignment, attending a band concert or a football game. She did not encourage me to get involved in community organizations or civic activities. She allowed me to participate in activities I chose on my own and for the most part, she just let me figure things out on my own. We also always seemed to live near family that we gathered with and relied on with great regularity and I don't remember ever looking at a calendar or schedule to determine my future plans. According to Kris Gutierrez, Carolina Izquierdo and Tamar Kremer-Sadlik, authors of the article "Middle Class Working Families' Beliefs and Eng...... middle of paper ...... the American middle class has passed the near of three decades of decline. This decline, coupled with the natural behavior of adaptation and adjustment, would logically lead to the desire to provide their children with the best possible path to accessing opportunities. Works Cited1. and Tamar Kremer-Sadlik. “Beliefs and engagement of middle-class working families in children's extracurricular activities: The social organization of children's futures.” » The International Journal of Learning 17.3 (2010): 633-56. Putnam, Robert D., Carl B. Frederick, and Kaisa Snellman. “Growing Class Gaps in Social Connectivity Among America's Youth,” Harvard Kennedy School of Government, August 8, 2012. Web May 21, 2014.3. 1." Unequal Childhoods: Class, Race, and Family Life. Berkeley: University of California, 2003. Print.