An extended family can be defined as a group of more than two generations of relatives who live together or very lose to one another. Extended families can include grandparents, spouses of children, cousins, aunts, and uncles. It also includes step children and their kin in cases when there has been second or more marriages.
American families are associated with this diversity. The traditional family has undergone various changes with factors such as divorce, remarriage, early pregnancy and changes in social values that have led to these changes. The American families of an extended nature comprises of the traditional nuclear family with husband, wife and children; joint-custody families of divorced parents sharing child custody; cohabiting families where unmarried men and women may or may not be sharing responsibility of raising children. Others include: single-parent families, homo-sexual families headed by gays or lesbians, and grandparents parenting grandchildren, due to the illness, death or non-involvement of the parent.
The American family can be looked into different perspectives as: black or white, large or small, wealthy or poor, or somewhere in between, a mother-headed, father-headed, or childless family, first or second time around, happy or miserable. The first thing to remember about the American family is that it doesn’t exist but families do exist in all kinds of economic and marital situations, as all of us can see and witness. Often, families, may be formed in various ways but, it remains essential to recall that most families achieve same tasks like child up bring, provision, socializing members, and assigning duties amongst the members.
The extended family gives many adults with a strong family base providing an intimacy and love. Extended family offers maximum chances for the growth of a person through its relations amid various groups.
Membership in a family can be decided only by each member of that family. It is the role of early teachers to be aware of who constitutes a child’s family and not to define the child’s family for them. Hence teachers should not try to alter a family’s view about its member in that family. Some factors that make families different from one another include: Ethnicity, race, culture, economy and geographical origin. It is important that these differences are considered in order to increase understanding on the part of teachers.
Ethnicity refers to a concept of a group of people based on a combination of religion, race, and cultural history. It describes a similarity transmitted by the family over generations. It is more than race, religion or national geographic origin. Ethnicity entails unconscious and conscious processes that accomplish a psychological need for historical continuity and identity. Ethnicity is sustained through unique family customs, proverbs and stories, norms and taboos, celebrations, foods and religious ceremonies. Differences have been noted between the notions of self-concept and ethnic identity. Families frequently find it hard to instill ethnic pride in their children mostly amongst the pluralistic society.
Culture refers to the unique aspects of life and history of various ethnic groups. Cultural differences often indicate differences in views on the family and the community, differences in expectations of children, differences in child up brings and differences in the values placed on education. Teachers should note that culture is learned not biological as they cannot identify a family’s culture by how the family members look but each individual learns his culture’s rules through daily living. For instance, table manners, interpersonal interactions and ways of demonstrating respect. An individual’s characteristics are both cultural and individual while the unique personality traits are not culturally based. Cultural behaviors are based in groups thus culture is characteristic of groups. Individuals are entitled to different degrees within a culture. Some families and individuals place more emphasis on cultural traditions than do others. Therefore, some cultures may place greater emphasis on individuality or conformity than others.
Members of a family may be associated in certain cultural behavior but not capable of describing the rules. This is because young children begin to learn their culture in their own home environments thus, behaviors seem natural to them. Not only can they not tell you why they engage in these behaviors, but also likely they are not conscious of all of the behaviors they have learned from their culture. Teachers would find it convenient to consider not only race, but also ethnicity and culture. There are higher chances that knowledge of Socio-cultural factors can give greater comprehension to teachers than gen concerning physical differences. Thus, including understanding of racial differences is most useful in the context of cultural and ethnic differences as well. Sometimes teachers unintentionally emphasize differences among groups of people and the effect is an insult rather than respectful toward diversity.
In the contemporary United States, families have vastly different experiences related to income and other resources. The Children’s Defense Fund has reported that in 1998, 22.7 percent of children under age six in the United States lived in poverty. For various ethnic groups, this proportion is even higher. There is no mystery about how to help families off welfare and out of poverty. States must provide the education, training, and work experience that parents need to compete for jobs with decent wages. In most cases teacher understanding of diversity does not include differences by family income or the traditional term, social class. Yet, financial resources have a tremendous impact on families, their practices, and their values. Families with low income have to learn the meaning of meeting their children’s’ basic requirements. States also need to remove the obstacles that often prevent parents from leaving welfare for work, lack of health care, transportation and child care.
Teachers or schools to positively respond to the family’s diversity, their main goal for understanding is to provide an inclusive environment. In that each child and family can feel a sense of belonging, no matter what similarities or differences they have with others in the group. This is a goal difficult to achieve because of many societal factors. As teachers plan for their groups of children and as they set their classroom rules and policies, checking for inclusiveness must be part of the process. The important act is what teachers will do when they realize that their classrooms are not inclusive.
In conclusion, families are different in many ways. It is important that teachers and schools work to increase their understanding of differences in families and interact with these differences sensitively. Teachers should accept the differences in families in which each child comes from and create a feeling of belonging for the celebration of diversity in families. Family members who view themselves as very different from teachers and other school personnel are less likely to be involved in their children’s education. Teachers should create an environment that encourages various types of family involvement so that children benefits from home and school participation.