This article examines and contrasts two distinct patterns of assisting children's learning that relate to adults' participation in different cultural practices: strategies to control children's attention and motivation versus supportive guidance including children's initiative. We report case studies of the instructional approaches taken by 4 research assistants who were asked to follow a script to casually demonstrate how to make an object, leaving room for children's initiative. The 2 research assistants who were bilingual European American elementary school teachers attempted to control the children's attention, motivation, and behavior in accord with accepted pedagogical practice - calling children's attention, controlling children's pace and keeping them on task using extensive step-by-step explanation, and evaluating the children's efforts with praise - even when they were trying not to, in order to follow the script. In contrast, the 2 bilingual Mexican-heritage research assistants guided the children with support for their initiative, in line with the cultural tradition of Learning by Observing and Pitching In to family and community endeavors, allowing the children to take initiative in managing their own attention, adjusting the pace of instruction collaboratively, using subtle nonverbal cues, and giving feedback without praise. We discuss the resilience of cultural approaches to supporting learning and encourage expanding repertoires of practice.

1.
Bowles, S., & Gintis, H. (1976). Schooling in capitalist America: Education reform and the contradictions of economic life. New York: Basic Books.
2.
Chavajay, P. (1993). Independent analyses of cultural variations and similarities in San Pedro and Salt Lake. Monographs of the Society for Research in Child Development. Serial No. 236, Vol. 58.
3.
Chavajay, P. (2006). How Mayan mothers with different amounts of schooling organize a problem-solving discussion with children. International Journal of Behavioral Development, 30, 371-382.
4.
Chavajay, P., & Rogoff, B. (2002). Schooling and traditional collaborative social organization of problem solving by Mayan mothers and children. Developmental Psychology, 38, 55-66.
5.
Correa-Chávez, M., & Rogoff, B. (2009). Children's attention to interactions directed to others: Guatemalan Mayan and European American patterns. Developmental Psychology, 45, 630-641.
6.
Edwards, D., & Mercer, N. (1987). Common knowledge. London: Methuen.
7.
Erickson, F., & Mohatt, G. (1982). Cultural organization of participation structure in two classrooms of Indian students. In G. Spindler (Ed.), Doing the ethnography of schooling. New York: Holt, Rinehart & Winston.
8.
Flores, M.T. (2007). Navigating contradictory communities of practice in learning to teach for social justice. Anthropology & Education Quarterly, 38, 380-402.
9.
Gutiérrez, K., & Rogoff, B. (2003). Cultural ways of learning: Individual traits or repertoires of practice. Educational Researcher, 32, 19-25.
10.
Hoffman, D.M. (2013). Power struggles: The paradoxes of emotion and control among child-centered mothers in the privileged United States. Ethos, 41, 75-97.
11.
Jordan, C., Tharp, R., & Baird-Vogt, L. (1992). “Just open the door”: Cultural compatibility and classroom rapport. In M. Saravia-Shore & S. Arvizu (Eds.), Cross-cultural literacy: Ethnographies of communication in multiethnic classrooms. New York: Garland.
12.
Kennedy, M. (2005). Inside teaching. Cambridge: Harvard University Press.
13.
Kremer-Sadlik, T., & Fatigante, M. (2012, November). Investing in children's future. Paper presented at the American Anthropological Association, San Francisco, CA.
14.
Laosa, L. (1982). School, occupation, culture, and family: The impact of parental schooling on the parent-child relationship. Journal of Educational Psychology, 74, 791-827.
15.
Levy, R.I. (1976). A conjunctive pattern in middle class informal and formal education. In T. Schwartz (Ed.), Socialization as cultural communication (pp. 177-187). Berkeley: University of California Press.
16.
Lipka, J. (1998). Transforming the culture of schools. Mahwah: Erlbaum.
17.
Lipka, J., & Yanez, E. (1998). Identifying and understanding cultural differences. In J. Lipka (Ed.), Transforming the culture of schools (pp. 111-137). Mahwah: Erlbaum.
18.
Matusov, E., & Rogoff, B. (2002). Newcomers and oldtimers: Educational philosophies-in-action of parent volunteers in a community of learners school. Anthropology & Education Quarterly, 33, 415-440.
19.
McCollum, P. (1989). Turn-allocation in lessons with North American and Puerto Rican students: A comparative study. Anthropology & Education Quarterly, 20, 133-156.
20.
Mehan, H. (1998). The study of social interaction in educational settings: Accomplishments and unresolved issues. Human Development, 41, 245-269.
21.
Mejía-Arauz, R., Rogoff, B., & Paradise, R. (2005). Cultural variation in children's observation during a demonstration. International Journal of Behavioral Development, 29, 282-291.
22.
Mohatt, G.V., & Sharp, N. (1998). The evolution and development of a Yup'ik teacher. In J. Lipka (Ed.), Transforming the culture of schools (pp. 41-69). Mahwah: Erlbaum.
23.
Monzó, L.D., & Rueda, R.S. (2003). Professional roles, caring, and scaffolds. American Journal of Education, 109, 438-471.
24.
National Research Council (1999). How people learn: Mind, brain, experience and school. Committee on Developments in the Science of Learning. J.D. Bransford, A. Brown, & R. Cocking (Eds.). Washington: National Academies Press.
25.
Ochs, E., & Izquierdo, C. (2009). Responsibility in childhood: Three developmental trajectories. Ethos, 37, 391-413.
26.
O'Connor, M.C., & Michaels, S. (1993). Aligning academic task and participation status through revoicing: Analysis of a classroom discourse strategy. Anthropology & Education Quarterly, 24, 318-335.
27.
O'Connor, M.C., & Michaels, S. (1996). Shifting participant frameworks. In D. Hicks (Ed.), Discourse, learning, and schooling (pp. 63-103). New York: Cambridge University Press.
28.
Paoli, A. (2003). Educación, autonomía, y lekil kuxlejal: Aproximaciones sociolingüísticas a la sabiduría de los tseltales. Mexico City: Universidad Autónoma Metropolitana.
29.
Paradise, R. (1994). Spontaneous cultural compatibility: Mazahua students and their teachers constructing trusting relations. Peabody Journal of Education, 69, 60-70.
30.
Paradise, R., & de Haan, M. (2009). Responsibility and reciprocity: Social organization of Mazahua learning practices. Anthropology & Education Quarterly, 40, 187-204.
31.
Paradise, R., & Rogoff, B. (2009). Side by side. Ethos, 37, 102-138.
32.
Philips, S.U. (1983). The invisible culture: Communication in classrooms and community on the Warm Springs Indian Reservation. Prospect Heights: Waveland.
33.
Rogoff, B. (1998). Cognition as a collaborative process. In D. Kuhn & R.S. Siegler (Eds.), W. Damon (Series Ed.), Handbook of child psychology. Vol. 2:Cognition, perception and language (5th ed., pp. 679-744). New York: Wiley.
34.
Rogoff, B. (2003). The cultural nature of human development. New York: Oxford University Press.
35.
Rogoff, B., Goodman Turkanis, C., & Bartlett, L. (2001). Learning together: Children and adults in a school community. New York: Oxford University Press.
36.
Rogoff, B., Mistry, J., Göncü, A., & Mosier, C. (1993). Guided participation in cultural activity by toddlers and caregivers. Monographs of the Society for Research in Child Development. Serial No. 236, Vol. 58.
37.
Rogoff, B., Moore, L., Najafi, B., Dexter, A., Correa-Chávez, M., & Solís, J. (2007). Children's development of cultural repertoires through participation in everyday routines and practices. In J.E Grusec & P.D. Hastings (Eds.), Handbook of socialization (pp. 490-515). New York: Guilford.
38.
Rogoff, B., Paradise, R., Mejía-Arauz, R., Correa-Chávez, M., & Angelillo, C. (2003). Firsthand learning through intent participation. Annual Review of Psychology, 54, 175-203.
39.
Seaman, J. (2001). A new teacher learning to share responsibility with children. In B. Rogoff, C. Goodman Turkanis, & L. Bartlett (Eds.), Learning together: Children and adults in a school community (pp. 138-141). New York: Oxford University Press.
40.
Smollet, E.W. (1975). Differential enculturation and social class in Canadian schools. In T.R. Williams (Ed.), Socialization and communication in primary groups. The Hague: Mouton.
41.
Sobe, N.W. (2010). Concentration and civilisation: Producing the attentive child in the age of Enlightenment. Paedagogica Historica, 46, 149-160.
42.
Stearns, R.D. (1986). Using ethnography to link school and community in rural Yucatan. Anthropology & Education Quarterly, 17, 6-24.
43.
Taylor, F.W. (1911). Principles of scientific management. New York: Harper Bros.
44.
Van Ness, H. (1981). Social control and social organization in an Alaskan Athabaskan classroom. In H.T. Trueba, G.P. Guthrie, & K.H.P. Au (Eds.), Culture and the bilingual classroom (pp. 120-138). Rowley: Newbury House.
Copyright / Drug Dosage / Disclaimer
Copyright: All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be translated into other languages, reproduced or utilized in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, recording, microcopying, or by any information storage and retrieval system, without permission in writing from the publisher.
Drug Dosage: The authors and the publisher have exerted every effort to ensure that drug selection and dosage set forth in this text are in accord with current recommendations and practice at the time of publication. However, in view of ongoing research, changes in government regulations, and the constant flow of information relating to drug therapy and drug reactions, the reader is urged to check the package insert for each drug for any changes in indications and dosage and for added warnings and precautions. This is particularly important when the recommended agent is a new and/or infrequently employed drug.
Disclaimer: The statements, opinions and data contained in this publication are solely those of the individual authors and contributors and not of the publishers and the editor(s). The appearance of advertisements or/and product references in the publication is not a warranty, endorsement, or approval of the products or services advertised or of their effectiveness, quality or safety. The publisher and the editor(s) disclaim responsibility for any injury to persons or property resulting from any ideas, methods, instructions or products referred to in the content or advertisements.
You do not currently have access to this content.