Parental Race/Ethnicity and Children’s Summer Activities: A Critical Race Approach

Abstract

Using the Early Childhood Longitudinal Study, Kindergarten Class of 2010–2011 (N = 3,748), we examine how children’s summer activities vary across White, Black, Latino, and Asian American families, net of socioeconomic and other characteristics. Overall, a majority of children play outside and use screen media daily, do learning activities three days or more per week, and take family trips. Attending summer school or camps is less common. As predicted from critical race perspectives, Black parents have children spend more time attending camps than other parents. Compared with White parents, Black and Asian parents have their children engaged in academic activities more and play outside less; Latino parents do learning activities with their children less, but are more likely to have them tutored. All the three non-White groups allow children to spend more time using screen media. More quantitative research using critical race perspectives in conceptualizing racial/ethnic differences in parenting is warranted.

Keywords

Children’s leisure time children’s screen time critical race theory parenting race/ethnicity summer learning

Introduction

American children have a long summer break. For over two months, parents are responsible for structuring their children’s activities. Despite the concern about children’s summer learning loss and its disparities by parental characteristics (Chin & Phillips, 2004), research that provides an overall picture of what children do during a summer break and how it varies across parental characteristics is scant. Existing research largely relies on convenience samples of children and their families drawn from local areas, much of which focuses on specific learning programs (Borman & Boulay, 2004; NASEM, 2019). Only a handful of studies used national surveys (Burkam, Ready, Lee, & LoGerfo, 2004; Gershenson, 2013; Redford, Burns, & Hall, 2018). These studies, across the board, highlight marked disparities in children’s activities by parental socioeconomic status (SES). Little research has investigated variation in children’s summer activities by parental race/ethnicity, even though racial/ethnic gaps in children’s achievement are of great concern (de Brey et al., 2019) and differences in parenting regarding children’s leisure and learning activities are considered one factor contributing to the racial/ethnic achievement gaps (Gibbs & Downey, 2020).

This article examines children’s leisure and learning activities during the summer after kindergarten using national data from the Early Childhood Longitudinal Study, Kindergarten Class of 2010–2011 (ECLS-K:2011), with specific attention to variation across White, Black, Latino, and Asian families at the same SES and other characteristics. We focus on the summer after kindergarten, in part because the first year of formal education is a critical period for children’s learning that has long-lasting consequences and thus research has focused on this developmental stage in understanding disparities in children’s summer learning loss across family characteristics (von Hippel, Workman, & Downey, 2018). We examine activities on which childrearing experts provide advice, including: (a) summer outside activities, such as family trips, camps, and outside play; (b) screen media use, including watching television, video, or movies, and playing video games; and (c) academic activities, like reading, using a computer, practicing numbers and letters with parents, attending summer school, and being tutored. To theorize racial/ethnic differences, unlike much prior quantitative research, we rely on critical race perspectives, which take perspectives of racial/ethnic minority families to shed light on racial/ethnic stratification as a primary structure of social inequality that affects parenting concerns (Burton, Bonilla‐Silva, Buckelew, & Hordge Freeman, 2010; Few, 2007). Dominant perspectives in quantitative research have been economic or cultural determinants, which are important but not enough to understand racial/ethnic differences in parenting and children’s daily life observed at the same SES and other family characteristics (Dow, 2019; Vallejo, 2012). By drawing on critical race perspectives, we hope to shift the narrative to the role of racial/ethnic stratification in shaping racial/ethnic parents’ concerns and strategies in optimizing children’s healthy development, regardless of parents’ economic resources. Racial/ethnic minority parents spend much time and mental or physical energy protecting their children from potential harms rooted in racism (Dow, 2016a, 2019; Elliott & Aseltine, 2013; Warner, 2010) and socializing their children to develop a sense of pride in their racial/ethnic identities (Umaña-Taylor & Hill, 2020). As such, how and where Black, Latino, and Asian children spend their leisure time may differ from their White counterparts even when they share the same SES and other characteristics.

Critical Race Approaches to Understanding Racial/Ethnic Differences in Parenting

What constitutes “good parenting” is socially constructed and thus varies across historical time and social locations (Hays, 1996). Childrearing experts today recommend parents use “responsive parenting” (or “intensive parenting”), which emphasizes that primary caregivers should be attentive and responsive to each child’s developmental needs, while they follow experts’ advice on how to facilitate each child’s healthy development at every developmental stage (American Academy of Pediatrics, 2020; Hays, 1996; US National Institute of Health, 2017). Although earlier research emphasized that responsive parenting is an affluent-class phenomenon (Lareau, 2003), more recent research suggests that it has become the ideal parenting method shared across the entire SES spectrum (Cha & Park, 2020; Ishizuka, 2019).

Racial/ethnic minority parents generally agree that responsive parenting is ideal (Ishizuka, 2019), but also recognize that mainstream experts do not always address their primary parenting concerns (Collins, 2000; Dow, 2019). Racial/ethnic minority parents believe that their children cannot simply do the same thing as their White counterparts do to be recognized positively or to avoid being judged negatively (Dow, 2016a; Elliott & Aseltine, 2013; Lee & Zhou, 2015). Minority parents must cultivate their children’s pride in their racial/ethnic roots, educate their children about racism (Umaña-Taylor & Hill, 2020), and tell their children to work twice as hard as their White counterparts do to be recognized (Putnam, 2015). Some minority parents choose schools and extracurricular organizations that offer programs with less quality, not because of lack of economic resources, but because they believe that it is important for their children to go to school or participate in organizations where adults are more sensitive with issues related to racism (Dow, 2019; Putnam, 2015; Warner, 2010).

The racial/ethnic stratification also leads to racial/ethnic differences in support networks for parents in caring for children. Research has long pointed to Black communities’ collective approach to parenting as opposed to White communities’ individualistic approach (Collins, 2000; Dow, 2016). Dow (2019) argues that in Black communities, where, unlike White communities, mothers’ involvement in market work is assumed, raising children is considered a project of the entire community, not only of the single family. Latino and Asian parents, a majority of whom are foreign-born, tend to rely on co-ethnics for childrearing support and emphasize loyalty and obligations to extended families and co-ethnic communities (Chao & Otsuki-Clutter, 2011; Vallejo, 2012). These differences are derived not just from ethnic-specific cultural values but also from adaptive strategies that racial/ethnic minority communities take to cope with the structural barriers that they experience due to racial/ethnic stratification (Dow, 2019; Lee & Zhou, 2015; Vallejo, 2012).

We would argue that although not always explicitly, these studies use critical race perspectives that acknowledge race/ethnicity as a social structure and a central component of social systems, in which the placement of people in racial/ethnic categories involves a hierarchy that produces unequal social relations across racial/ethnic groups (Burton et al., 2010). The critical race perspectives help researchers shift the center from a mainstream White parents’ view to the perspectives of racial/ethnic minority parents in formulating narratives in empirical research (Few, 2007). In this article, we use critical race perspectives in conceptualizing racial/ethnic differences in parenting regarding children’s summer activities. In the sections that follow, we first discuss mainstream childrearing experts’ recommendations regarding each of the summer activities examined in this article. Then we discuss how racial/ethnic minority parents may see the utility of those activities for their children’s well-being differently from mainstream childbearing recommendations, which in turn lead to hypotheses on variations in children’s participations in those activities between racial/ethnic minority families and White families.

Children’s Summer Activities: Racial/Ethnic Differences

Mainstream childrearing experts recommend daily physical activity, limited screen time, reading, and non-academic learning, such as visiting museums, rather than rigorous academic practice as activities that facilitate children’s healthy development during the summer (Chin & Phillips, 2004; NASEM, 2019). Drawing on the critical race perspective, we expect that summer activities of children of racial/ethnic minority parents are less likely than those of children of White parents to be aligned with these expert recommendations, as we will discuss below.

Summer Outside Activities: Family Trips, Camps, and Outside Play

Experts emphasize that a summer break is the time when children should be exposed to new experiences that will inspire their future interest (NASEM, 2019). Along this line, many parents take their children on trips to places like seashores, lakes or rivers, zoos or aquariums, art or science museums, and national or state parks (Chin & Phillips, 2004). These trips are considered beneficial for children’s learning through providing them with new perspectives (Jant, Haden, Uttal, & Babcock, 2014). Some parents, especially employed parents, use day camps through which their children can go on field trips and learn new things while having fun with other children (Chin & Phillips, 2004). Although some camps are costly, affordable camps are available, often held by local youth centers, libraries, or religious organizations (NASEM, 2019). We expect that Black families are more likely than other families to have their children attend summer camps. Black mothers are more likely than mothers of the three other racial/ethnic groups to be employed full-time, year-round (Lu, Wang, & Han, 2017). Reflecting their community-oriented childrearing, Black families are more likely than families of the three other racial/ethnic groups to use center care (Fram & Kim, 2008) and early childhood education (Ressler, Ackert, Ansari, & Crosnoe, 2020) at the same SES level. In contrast, consistent with the tendency that they rely on co-ethnic support, Latino and Asian families are more likely than White and Black families to use relative care rather than center care (Fram & Kim, 2008; Ressler et al., 2020). Thus, we expect that Latino and Asian families are less likely than Black and White families to have their children attend summer camps.

Childrearing experts emphasize the benefits of outdoor play for children’s healthy development (NASEM, 2019). However, racial/ethnic minority parents may not be as enthusiastic as White parents about the benefits of outside play for their children’s well-being. Outside the home, racial/ethnic minority children are at the risk of experiencing racial/ethnic micro-aggressions, defined as daily verbal, behavioral, and environmental indignities that communicate hostile, derogatory, or negative racial slights and insults (Huynh, 2012). Dow (2016a) argues that Black Americans feel as if there is a limited range of physical and emotional expressions that they are allowed to display to avoid others’ negative stereotyping, and that Black parents feel as if they must monitor and restrict their children’s physical and emotional expressions when they are in public. Although not focusing on the summer, using time diary data from a national survey, Hofferth and Sandberg (2001) found that Black, Latino, and Asian children spent less time playing or doing sports than White children. Using another national survey, Fakhouri and colleagues (2013) found that Black and Latino children were less likely than White children to spend time on physical activities; Asian children were not included in the study. In all, we expect that Black, Latino, and Asian parents have their children play outside less frequently than White parents during the summer.

Screen Media Use

The American Academy of Pediatrics (2018) recommends active parental mediation of children’s use of media technology to foster children’s positive digital experiences. Policy makers tend to focus on negative effects of playing video games on children, although some researchers have called for more recognition of its positive effects on children, such as enhanced cognitive skills (Granic, Lobel, & Engels, 2014). Parents generally agree on potential negative effects of screen media use on children’s developmental outcomes, but also recognize a positive role that screen media play in their family life. TV programs, movies, or video games can be a major part of family entertainment (Coyne, Padilla-Walker, Fraser, Fellows, & Day, 2014). Screen media can facilitate parent–child conversations especially about sensitive topics and social issues (Evans, Jordan, & Horner, 2011). Most children play video games for fun, as a stress reliever, and for a desire for social interaction with peers (Ferguson & Olson, 2013). Parents vary in the degree and style of mediation, perhaps because they differ in their views of positive effects of screen media on children (Brown & Smolenaers, 2018; Nikken & Schols, 2015).

Some evidence suggests that racial/ethnic minority communities have more positive views of screen media than White communities. Black, Latino, and Asian children must grow up living with bicultural identities—being both American and Black, Latino, or Asian American (Flores-González, 2017; Ward, Day, & Thomas, 2010). Minority parents use ethnic media as an important tool to expose their children to their own racial/ethnic culture. Harris-Lacewell (2010) argues that Black popular culture in music videos and TV programs are crucial in communicating their authentic fashion, speech patterns, and political ideologies within Black communities. Zhou and Cai (2002) contend that Chinese language media keep immigrants well informed of the homeland and the local immigrant social networks. Njoroge and colleagues (2013) found that Black and Asian parents were more likely than White parents to believe that watching TV would help preschoolers to play better with one another. Due to the consumption of both mainstream and ethnic media along with their communities’ more positive views of screen media, racial/ethnic minority children may spend more time using screen media than White children. Past research using national data, none of which focused on the summer, shows that Black children spend more time watching TV (Hofferth & Sandberg, 2001) and playing video games (Fakhouri, Hughes, Brody, Kit, & Ogden, 2013; Granic, Lobel, & Engels, 2014; Rideout, Lauricella, & Wartella, 2011) than White children. Some studies found that Latino children spent more time watching TV and playing video games than White children (Fakhouri et al., 2013; Rideout et al., 2011); other studies found little difference between Latino and White children (Hofferth & Sandberg, 2001). Asian children spend more time watching TV (Hofferth & Sandberg, 2001) and playing video games (Rideout et al., 2011) than White children. Some of these studies controlled for other key characteristics such as SES (Hofferth & Sandberg, 2001); others did not (Fakhouri et al., 2013; Granic et al., 2014; Rideout et al. 2011). Together, we expect that net of differences in SES and other characteristics, Black, Latino, and Asian parents report more time that their children spent using screen media than White parents during the summer break.

Academic Activities

The importance of summer reading for children’s literacy development has been emphasized (Borman & Boulay, 2004). Except for reading, the general norm is that a summer break is the time for children to be free from rigorous academic work (Chin & Philips, 2004). Still, some parents keep their children engaged in academic practices during the summer to get ahead or to review past learning materials, by having their children use a computer, practice numbers and letters at home, attend summer school, and receive tutoring. This may especially be the case for racial/ethnic minority parents. Asian parents’ emphasis on their children’s academic success has been well documented (Chao & Otsuki-Clutter, 2011). Although this is often attributed to Asian cultural values, this explanation may not capture the whole story. Instead, Asian parents believe that their children must attain high academic achievements in special areas—science, engineering, and medicine—in order to be competitive in the job market where their children will face racial discrimination (Chao & Otsuki-Clutter, 2011; Lee & Zhou, 2015). Although often overshadowed by stereotypes of Asian parents' educational values, research suggests that Black and Latino parents are also more likely than White parents to emphasize the importance of hard work and educational attainments for their children’s success in moving up in the social ladder. Qualitative studies have documented that Black parents emphasize that their children need to work twice as hard as their White counterparts to be recognized (Putnam, 2015). Latino parents often say that their children’s going to college was the purpose of their moving to the United Sates (Vallejo, 2012). Studies using national samples also show that, other characteristics held constant, compared with White parents, Black, Latino, and Asian parents are more likely to emphasize hard work is an important trait for their children to acquire (Nomaguchi & Milkie, 2019), more likely to have higher educational expectations for their children in kindergarten (Sonnenschein & Galindo, 2015), more likely to help elementary-school-age children with schoolwork (Li & Hamlin, 2019), and more likely to have their children spend time studying (Hofferth & Sandberg, 2001). Among high school students, studies find that Black, Latino, and Asian parents are more likely than White parents to use supplemental education programs outside of the formal educational system, such as SAT preparation courses, tutoring, or college preparation camps (Buchmann, Condron, & Roscigno, 2010; Ho, Park, & Kao, 2019). Together, we expect that Black, Latino, and Asian parents are more likely than White parents to have their children engaged in academic activities during the summer break.

The Present Study

Mainstream childrearing experts recommend non-academic learning experiences through family trips, camps, outside play, limited screen media use, and reading for children’s summer activities. Based on foregoing discussions using the critical race perspectives, we expect that children of Black, Latino, and Asian parents are more likely than their counterparts of White parents to play outside less, to spend more time using screen media, and to be engaged in academic work during the summer after kindergarten. We also expect that, other characteristics equal, children of Black parents are more likely than children of White parents—as well as Latino and Asian parents—to spend time attending summer camps, whereas Latino and Asian parents are less likely than White parents to have their children spend time attending summer camps.

All analyses controlled for family characteristics that differ across the four racial/ethnic groups and are related to children’s activities examined in the current analysis. SES indicators, such as parental education, family income, and neighborhood safety, as well as maternal employment and immigration status vary across the four racial/ethnic groups and are related to children’s activities (Cheadle & Amato, 2011; Crosnoe, Ansari, Purtell, & Wu, 2016; Hofferth & Sandberg, 2001; Nomaguchi & House, 2013). Other demographic characteristics of parents, such as age, marital status, and the number of children living in the household (Cheadle & Amato 2011; Hofferth & Sandberg, 2001), as well as the study children’s gender (Hofferth & Sandberg, 2001), are also controlled for. To take characteristics of schools into account, whether children were attending private school and whether children were provided a booklist for summer reading by their school are controlled for. We control for children’s reading scores in spring before the summer break because parents may encourage their children to do different activities depending on their children’s academic abilities (Crosnoe et al., 2016).

Method

Data

The ECLS-K:2011 is a longitudinal study of a nationally representative sample of children who attended kindergarten in 2010–2011 conducted by the National Center for Education Statistics (Tourangeau et al., 2017). It uses a three-stage stratified sampling procedure: From a sample of geographic areas consisting of a county or groups of counties, a sample of children from each of more than 1000 public and private schools offering kindergarten programs was selected. The survey includes interviews with a “primary” parent, defined as a parent or guardian in the household who identified himself or herself as the person who knew the most about the child’s care, education, and health, interviews with teachers and school administrators, and one-on-one assessments of children. Information about children’s activities during the summer break was collected in the Fall First Grade (FG1) and the Fall Second Grade (FG2) parent interviews. Our main focus was on the summer after kindergarten.¹

We used the Fall Kindergarten (FK) interview to obtain primary parents’ basic demographic characteristics, including race/ethnicity, education, and age, and used the Spring Kindergarten (SK) interview to measure primary parents’ family income, neighborhood safety, employment status, marital status, the number of children living in the household, and children’s school characteristics and reading scores. The analytical sample focused on children whose primary parents participated in the parent interviews in FK, SK, and FG1 (n = 4,269). This is much smaller than the original sample size (n = 18,174), largely because FG1 (as well as FG2) was conducted for a subsample of children and their families only. We excluded 429 cases where primary parents’ relationships to the study children were missing and then 92 cases where primary parents were Native American, “other” race, or multiple races. These procedures resulted in the analytical sample size of N = 3,748. The vast majority (85%) of primary parents were biological mothers, 10% were biological fathers, and 5% were other adults.

Dependent Measures

Children’s summer activities included a total of 10 activities in three broad categories we discussed earlier. Non-academic learning activities included three types. Family trips were measured as number of places out of the six kinds to which the focal children went with their family during the summer, including: (a) an art gallery, museum, or historical site; (b) zoos or aquariums, (c) amusement parks, (d) beaches, lakes, rivers, or state or national parks; (e) plays or concerts; and (f) a large city other than where the child lives (ranging from 0 to 6). Time spent in summer camps was measured as the total hours children spent attending day or overnight camps during the summer, ranging from 0 to 450. Outdoor play was measured by the question, “On a typical week during the summer, how often did the child play outside actively (e.g., running, jumping, or swinging) (1 = never, 2 = once or twice, 3 = 3 to 6 times, and 4 = every day).

Screen media use included two types. Time spent watching TV was measured as minutes per day based on the question, “On a typical summer day, how many hours of television, videotapes, or DVDs on average did the child watch?” This included TV shows, videos, or DVDs watched on a TV, computer, or handheld device like an iPad or cellphone; but not games played on gaming systems like PlayStation, Wii, Xbox, or handheld devices. Time spent playing video games was measured as minutes per day based on the question, “On a typical summer day, how much time did the child spend playing video games?” which included games played on systems like PlayStation, Wii, or Xbox, or on handheld devices such as a Nintendo DS, Sony PSP, iPod, iPad, or cellphone, or games played on the computer.

Academic activities included five types. Reading on their own was based on the question, “During a typical week of the summer, how often did the child look at or read books on his/her own?” (1 = never, 2 = once or twice, 3 = 3 to 6 times, and 4 = every day). Computer use was measured by the question, “During a typical week of the summer, how often did the child use a computer or other electronic device for educational purposes? By electronic device, we mean any type of computer, cell phone, smart phone, iPod, reading device (e.g., Kindle or Nook), or game system (e.g., Wii, Xbox, DS, and PlayStation),” (1 = never, 2 = once or twice, 3 = 3 to 6 times, and 4 = every day). Studying with parents was the average of three questions asking how often during a typical week of the summer the primary parents or any other family member did (a) math activities, such as learning numbers, adding, subtracting, or measuring, (b) writing activities, and (c) reading books with the child (1 = never, 2 = once or twice, 3 = 3 to 6 times, and 4 = every day). For summer school attendance, the primary parents were asked, “Did this child attend summer school this summer? Please do not include summer camps.” If they answered “yes,” they were asked whether the summer school program was (a) required by the child's school, (b) suggested by the child's school, or (c) parents decided to send the child to the program for enrichment purposes. We created three dummy variables, including the child attended no summer school program (reference), the child attended a summer school program required or suggested by the child's school, and the child attended a summer school program that the parent decided to send the child to Studying with a tutor was a dichotomous variable based on the question, “Was this child tutored over the summer on a regular basis, by someone other than you or family member, in a specific subject, such as reading, math, science, or a foreign language?” where children who were tutored over the summer were coded 1 and those who were not were coded 0.

Independent Measures

Primary parent’s race/ethnicity was measured in FK as four dummy variables including non-Latino White (reference), non-Latino Black, Latino, and non-Latino Asian (including Pacific Islanders).

Control Measures

Primary parent’s education was measured in FK as a dichotomous variable where those who had a bachelor’s degree or higher were coded 1 and those who did not have a bachelor’s degree were coded 0. Family income in SK was a variable created by the ECLS-K, ranging from 1 = $ 5,000 or less, 2 = $5,001 to $10,000, 3 = $10,101 to $15,000, … 16 = $75,001 to $100,000, 17 = $100,001 to $200,000, and 18 = $200,001 or more, indicating the annual income of the household. Neighborhood safety in SK was measured by the question, “How safe is it for children to play outside during the day in your neighborhood?” (1 = not at all safe, 2 = somewhat safe, and 3 = very safe). Primary parent’s employment status in SK was measured as three dummy variables including non-employed (reference), employed part-time (34 hours or less per week), and employed full-time (35 hours or more per week). Primary parent’s age was measured in years in FK. The number of children under age 18 years in the household was measured in SK. Primary parent’s marital status was measured in SK as three dummy variables including married (reference), cohabiting, and single. Child’s gender was measured in FK as a dichotomous variable (1 = girl and 0 = boy). Book list was a dichotomous variable based on the question asked in FG1 whether the child’s school provided a book list with particular books to read over the summer (1 = yes and 0 = no). Private school was measured in SK as a dichotomous variable (1 = private school and 0 = public school). About 4% of children were home-schooled or attending unknown types of school. These children were imputed into either private or public school (see below). Child’s reading score in SK was measured with the item-response-theory scale provided by the ECLS-K:2011.

Analytical Plans

We first compared means or proportions for all variables across the four racial/ethnic groups, using t-tests. For multivariate analyses, we used ordinary least squares (OLS), logistic, or multinomial regression models depending on the dependent variables. All analyses were weighted using the weight variable provided by the ECLS-K:2011 to adjust for non-response to parent interviews, attrition in the follow-up interviews, and other characteristics. The weighted data produce a nationally representative sample of children who attended school from FK through FG1 in 2010–2011 (Tourangeau et al., 2017). Missing cases were imputed using the multiple imputation procedure suggested by Allison (2001) with 25 iterations.

Results

Descriptive Results

Table 1 presents means or proportions for variables in the analysis. On average, children went to 3.44 out of the six trip destinations asked in the survey during the summer break after kindergarten. Looking at each destination, about 86% of children went to beaches, rivers, or national parks; 64% went to zoos or aquariums; 59% visited large cities where they did not live; 59% went to amusement parks; 50% visited museums or historical sites; and 25% went to see a play or a concert. On average, children spent a total of 29 hours attending camps during the summer break. This number may seem to be low; this is because only about 25% of parents had their children attend summer camps. Among children who attended summer camps, the average hours spent in these camps was 117 hours (not shown). The average score for outside play was 3.71 with the scale where 3 = 3 to 6 times per week and 4 = every day. To get a more intuitive sense, we looked at the proportion of parents who chose the response “every day.” About three-fourths (76%) of parents reported that their children played outside every day. On average, children spent 2.31 hours per day watching TV and spent 0.82 hour, or 49 minutes, per day playing video games. Almost all parents reported that their children spent watching TV every day and a large majority (71%) reported that their children spent playing video games every day. The average score for reading was 2.97 with the scale where 2 = once or twice and 3 = 3 to 6 times per week. Sixty-eight percent reported that their children read three or more days per week. The average score for educational computer use was 2.38 with the same scale used for reading; 44% reported that their children used a computer for educational purposes three or more times per week. The average score for studying with adult family members was 2.52 with the same scale used for reading; 59% reported that their children studied three or more days per week. A small percentage of children attended summer school: 5% attended summer school because it was required and 5% did so without it being required. Only 4% of children received tutoring.

Table 1.

Means (SD) or Proportions for All Variables in the Analysis for the Total Sample and by Race/ethnicity (N = 3,748).

	Total sample 100.0%	White 60.4%	Black 12.0%	Latino 23.2%	Asian 4.3%
Summer activities
Family trips [range: 0–6]	3.44 (1.46)	3.60 (1.57)	3.31 (1.74)***	3.03 (1.24) ***^b	3.75 (1.01) ^cf
Beaches, rivers	0.86	0.90	0.78***	0.80***	0.88 ^cf
Zoos, aquariums	0.64	0.66	0.66	0.59***^a	0.68^e
Large cities	0.59	0.61	0.57	0.53***	0.70**^cf
Amusement parks	0.59	0.58	0.61	0.60	0.68***^ad
Museums	0.50	0.57	0.41***	0.37***	0.55 ^cf
Play or concert	0.25	0.29	0.25	0.14***^c	0.28^f
Summer camps in hours	29.44 (80.50)	31.16 (88.96)	55.74 (133.75)***	11.29 (42.49)***^c	30.07 (55.31)^cf
No summer camps	0.75	0.69	0.75*	0.90***^c	0.77**^f
Outside play [1–4]	3.71 (0.57)	3.77 (0.55)	3.60 (0.76)***	3.63 (0.54) ***	3.46 (0.49) ***^bf
Every day	0.76	0.81	0.68***	0.72***	0.55***^cf
TV hours in hours/day	2.31 (1.55)	2.08 (1.40)	3.28 (2.78)***	2.45 (1.24) ***^c	1.97 (0.99) ^cf
No TV hour	0.02	0.02	0.01	0.02	0.02
Video games in hours/day	0.82 (0.96)	0.74 (0.95)	1.14 (1.36)***	0.87 (0.85) ***^c	0.78 (0.88)^c
No video game hour	0.29	0.27	0.24	0.33***^b	0.31
Reading [1–4]	2.97 (0.89)	3.02 (0.96)	3.00 (1.05)	2.82 (0.75) ***^b	2.98 (0.68)^e
At least 3 times/week	0.68	0.71	0.69	0.61***^b	0.69^e
Computer use [1–4]	2.38 (0.99)	2.37 (1.05)	2.74 (1.13)***	2.19 (0.87) ***^c	2.54 (0.74) **^af
At least 3 times/week	0.44	0.42	0.59	0.38*^c	0.50*^af
Studying w/parents [1–4]	2.52 (0.53)	2.52 (0.57)	2.63 (0.64)***	2.45 (0.46) ***^c	2.56 (0.44)^e
At least 3 times/week	0.59	0.61	0.66	0.53***^c	0.57^a
Summer school, req	0.05	0.03	0.05	0.07***	0.10***^a
Summer school, opt	0.05	0.04	0.10***	0.07***	0.05^b
Studying with a tutor	0.04	0.03	0.05	0.05	0.11***^bf
Control variables
Parents’ characteristics
Foreign-born	0.22	0.05	0.09*	0.59***^c	0.89***^cf
College graduates	0.31	0.38	0.21***	0.13***^b	0.55***^cf
Family income [1–18]	10.34 (5.60)	11.87 (5.85)	7.63 (5.68)***	7.29 (4.14)***	12.97 (3.70) ***^cf
Neighborhood safety [1–3]	2.68 (0.54)	2.79 (0.50)	2.62 (0.64)***	2.40 (0.53)***^c	2.65 (0.41) ***^f
Employment status
Employed, full-time	0.41	0.40	0.58***	0.33***^b	0.43 ^ce
Employed, part-time	0.21	0.24	0.14***	0.16***	0.15***
Non-employed	0.38	0.35	0.28***	0.51***^c	0.43***^ce
Age [14–77]	34.38 (6.56)	35.11 (7.20)	33.39 (7.55)***	32.78 (5.44)***	35.48 (4.21) ^cf
Number of children	2.57 (1.17)	2.50 (1.25)	2.60 (1.44)	2.78 (1.02) ***^a	2.20 (0.76) ***^cf
Marital status
Married	0.70	0.76	0.37***	0.65***^c	0.91***^cf
Cohabiting	0.03	0.02	0.02	0.05***^b	0.02^e
Single	0.28	0.22	0.61***	0.30***^c	0.07***^cf
Child and school characteristics
Girl	0.48	0.48	0.48	0.51	0.49
Private school	0.11	0.13	0.12	0.05***^c	0.13^f
Book list	0.29	0.30	0.34	0.24***^c	0.35^f
Reading score in SK	69.25 (14.42)	71.12 (15.72)	66.46 (15.90)***^a	64.54 (10.80) ***^a	76.05 (13.35) ***^cf

Differences from White were significant at *p <.05; **p <.01; ***p <.001. Differences from Black were significant at ^ap <.05; ^bp <.01; ^cp <.001. Differences from Latino were significant at ^dp <.05; ^ep <.01; ^fp <.001. “SK” stands for Spring Kindergarten. The data are weighted using the longitudinal weight for parents who participate from Fall Kindergarten through Fall First Grade.

Children’s summer activities differed by parental race/ethnicity at the descriptive level. We do not discuss each racial/ethnic difference here because some of these differences are due to differences in demographic and SES characteristics across racial/ethnic groups and our focus is to examine racial/ethnic differences after controlling for these characteristics. Some racial/ethnic differences in parents’ demographic and SES characteristics are worth mentioning. As shown in Table 1, compared with White counterparts, Black parents were younger, less likely to have a college degree, more likely to report poorer neighborhood quality, more likely to be employed full-time, more likely to be single, and had less family income. Many differences between White and Latino parents were also found. Latino parents were younger, less likely to have a college degree, more likely to be foreign-born, more likely to report poorer neighborhood quality, less likely to be employed, more likely to be cohabiting, and had less family income. Compared with White counterparts, Asian parents were older, more likely to be foreign-born, more likely to have a fewer number of children, more likely to be employed full-time, and more likely to be married, and more likely to report poorer neighborhood quality.

Multivariate Results

Table 2 presents the results from multivariate analyses that examined racial/ethnic variation in children’s summer activities net of differences in SES and other characteristics. In the models presented here, White parents were used as the omitted reference group. We conducted the same models rotating the reference group to compare coefficients across the four racial/ethnic groups; significant differences are noted in Table 2. After controlling for SES and other characteristics, there were no significant racial/ethnic differences in the number of family trip destinations. After adding in SES and other controls, Black children’s longer hours spent in summer camps than children of the three other groups remained significant. Black and Asian children’s less frequent outside play than White children stayed significant, whereas Latino children were not different from White children. To better understand these racial/ethnic differences in the frequency of outside play, in a supplemental analysis (not shown), we conducted a logistic regression model using the dichotomous variable indicating whether children played outside every day or not, and calculated the predicted percentage of children who played outside every day for each of the four parental racial/ethnic groups, using the coefficients and the means. Other characteristics equal, the predicted percentage of children who played outside every day was 80% for White children, 77% for Latino children, 68% for Black children, and 65% for Asian children.

Table 2.

Regression Models Predicting the Association Between Parental Race/Ethnicity and Children’s Summer Activities After Kindergarten (N = 3748).

	Summer outside activities						Screen time				Academic activities
	Family trips^g		Hours in camps^g		Outside play^g		TV hours^g		Video game hours^g		Educational computer use^g
	b	SE	b	SE	b	SE	b	SE	b	SE	b	SE
Black	−.033	.081	26.870	4.663***	−.148	.034***	1.084	.084***	.322	.056***	.423	.064***
Latino	−.098	.080	−4.290	4.126^c	−.034	.032^b	.400	.087***^c	.224	.051***	−.010	.054^c
Asian	.066	.130	−6.061	7.247^c	−.196	.054***^b	.382	.150*^c	.344	.092***	.284	.096**^e
Foreign-born	−.089	.077	−1.982	4.183	−.120	.030***	−.453	.083***	−.283	.050***	−.209	.054***
College degrees	.388	.058***	13.265	3.290***	−.004	.024	−.399	.062***	−.207	.040***	−.002	.042
Family income	.055	.006***	1.663	.329***	.006	.002**	−.018	.006**	−.009	.004*	.001	.004
Neighborhood safety	.006	.047	−5.282	2.544*	.110	.018***	−.056	.049	−.013	.030	.036	.032
Employed, full-time	−.013	.056	16.333	3.463***	.001	.023	.045	.060	.075	.050	.086	.040*
Employed, part-time	.087	.066	.179	3.736	.018	.028	−.183	.091	.043	.047	−.009	.052
Mothers' age	.000	.004	.429	.267	.000	.002	−.003	.004	.001	.003	.005	.003
Number of children	−.091	.020***	−6.229	1.113***	.045	.008***	−.078	.021***	−.014	.014	−.014	.014
Cohabiting	−.048	.142	2.380	7.952	.034	.058	.017	.152	−.007	.096	−.032	.102
Single	.142	.061*	9.648	3.438**	.030	.025	−.126	.066	−.007	.042	−.046	.044
Girls	.020	.045	−.826	2.544	−.061	.018**	−.085	.049	−.411	.031***	.037	.033
Private school	.287	.075***	25.192	4.543***	−.010	.031	−.027	.080	−.080	.052	.013	.054
Book list	.159	.054**	2.623	3.010	.049	.021*	−.185	.054***	−.049	.035	.030	.037
Reading score in SK	.005	.002**	.116	.096	−.002	.001***	−.005	.002*	.002	.001	.003	.001**
Intercept	2.523	.254***	1.189	14.100	3.456	.095***	3.411	.256***	1.041	.159***	1.851	.170***
R² or −2 log likelihood	.136***		.103***		.062***		.118***		.093***		.044***

	Academic activities
	Reading^g		Study with parents^g		Tutored^h		Summer schoolⁱ
	Reading^g		Study with parents^g		Tutored^h		Required		Voluntary
	b	SE	b	SE	b	SE	b	SE	b	SE
Black	.032	.053	.078	.031*	.659	.308*	.661	.381	.737	.228**
Latino	−.061	.048	−.069	.031*^c	1.137	.247***	.110	.325	.213	.284
Asian	.119	.084^d	.085	.051^e	1.211	.384**	.409	.355	.040	.496
Foreign-born	−.218	.045***	−.066	.029*	.097	.244	1.064	.250***	.438	.256
College degree	.071	.036*	.013	.022	−.192	.204	.485	.213*	.066	.219
Family income	−.009	.004*	−.008	.002***	.053	.020**	.027	.022	.009	.020
Neighborhood safety	.043	.029	−.011	.017	.196	.161	.112	.168	.203	.153
Employed full-time	−.089	.036*	−.024	.021	.080	.206	.148	.230	−.019	.205
Employed part-time	−.038	.039	−.006	.025	.257	.285	−.051	.261	.263	.221
Age	−.005	.003	.001	.002	.007	.015	−.009	.017	.004	.013
Number of children	.023	.012	−.023	.008**	−.300	.087***	−.194	.087*	−.142	.069*
Cohabiting	.147	.088	.067	.055	−.154	.535	.593	.445	−.468	.572
Single	.005	.038	.002	.024	−.014	.226	.335	.234	.658	.191***
Girls	.335	.028***	.107	.017***	.014	.161	.123	.168	.074	.154
Private school	−.033	.047	.003	.029	.670	.222**	.799	.222***	−.342	.316
Book list	.151	.031***	.090	.020***	.239	.172	−.335	.201	.269	.164
Reading score in SK	.011	.001***	.001	.001	−.016	.006*	−.006	.006	−.058	.008***
Intercept	2.177	.148***	2.558	.096***	−3.335	.863***	−3.320	.904***	−.175	.876
R² or −2 log likelihood	.096***		.033**		1290.015***		2595.683***

*p <.05; **p <.01; ***p <.001. Omitted reference groups are: White, college × white, non-employed, married, boys, public school, no booklist. Differences from Black parents were significant at ^ap< .05; ^bp < .01; ^cp < .001. Differences from Latino parents were significant at ^dp < .05; ^ep < .01; ^fp < .001.

^gOrdinary-Least-Squared-regression models

^hLogistic regression models

ⁱMultinomial regression models

“SK” stands for Spring Kindergarten. The data are weighted using the longitudinal weight for parents who participate from Fall Kindergarten through Fall First Grade.

Black, Latino, and Asian children spent more time than White children watching TV and playing video games, even when SES and other characteristics were equal. Predicted daily hours spent on watching TV (not shown in Tables), calculated using the coefficients and the means, were 3.15 hours for Black children, 2.47 hours for Latino children, 2.46 hours for Asian children, and 2.07 hours for White children. Predicted daily hours spent on playing video games were about 1 hour for Black and Asian children, 0.94 hour for Latino children, and 0.71 hour for White children. On these two types of screen media together, Black children spent 1.37 more hours, Latino children spent 0.63 more hour, and Asian children spent 0.68 more hour, every day, compared with White children, all else equal.

For academic activities, net of SES and other characteristics, there were no racial/ethnic differences in the frequency of children’s looking at or reading books per week. Black and Asian children were more likely than White and Latino children to use a computer for educational purposes. In supplemental analysis that is not shown, we conducted a logistic regression model using the dichotomous variable indicating whether children used a computer for educational purposes three or more days a week; the predicted percentage for children who used a computer for educational purposes three ore more days a week was 40% for White children, 42% for Latino children, 51% for Asian children, and 59% for Black children. Even after controlling for SES and other characteristics, Black parents were more likely than parents of the three other groups to have their children study with them, whereas Latino parents were less likely than other parents to do so. At the same SES and other characteristics, Black, Latino, and Asian parents were more likely than White parents to have their children tutored. The predicted percentage of parents who had children study with tutors was 8% for Asian parents, 7% for Latino parents, 5% for Black parents, and 3% for White parents. Black parents were more likely than White parents to have their children attend summer school when they were not required to do so. Latino and Asian children were no more likely than White children to attend summer school after other characteristics were held constant.

In sum, during the summer after kindergarten, a majority of American children play outside, watch TV and play video games daily, read or look at books and do some language or math activities with parents three days or more per week, and take family trips to places like beaches, zoos, and cities. Attending summer camps or summer school, or having tutors, is less common. Consistent with predictions based on critical race perspectives, children's participation in these activities vary by parental race/ethnicity. Compared with children of White parents, children of Black or Asian parents play outside less often and are more engaged in academic activities. Black parents have children spend more time attending camps than other parents. Latino parents study with their children less than other parents but are more likely than White parents to have their children receive tutoring. Parents of all of the three non-White groups allow children to spend more time using screen media.

Discussion

Using data from the ECLS-K:2011, this article provided a national portrait of US children’s activities in three broad areas—summer outside activities (family trips, summer camps, and outside play), screen media (TV and video games), and academic learning activities (computer use, reading, study with parents, summer school, and tutoring)—during the summer after kindergarten, focusing on variation across White, Black, Latino, and Asian families, net of SES and other background characteristics. From a critical race perspective, which focuses on parenting concerns of minority families in preparing their children for the racially-stratified society, we predicted that Black, Latino, and Asian children’s leisure and learning activities during the summer would be less likely than White children’s to be aligned with mainstream childrearing experts’ recommendations. As expected, we find that Black and Asian children are less likely to play outside and more likely to use screen media than White children. Latino children are also more likely than White children to spend time using screen media. In addition, Black parents are more likely than parents of the three other racial/ethnic groups to have their children spend time in summer camps. Our aim was to use critical race narratives to formulate predictions, interpret findings, and encourage future quantitative research to incorporate critical race narratives to advance knowledge of racial/ethnic variation in parenting (Burton et al., 2010; Dow, 2019; Few, 2007; Vallejo, 2012). We acknowledge that the ECLS-K:2011 did not have good measures of racism or racial socialization. We argue that the lack of direct assessments of critical race perspectives does not prevent us from pursuing our specific aim; the lack of measures of economic or cultural explanations has not prevented researchers from using economic or cultural narratives in interpreting racial/ethnic differences in parenting or children’s activities that are observed after SES and other characteristics are held constant.

That SES and other characteristics equal, racial/ethnic minority children spend more time using screen media and less time physically active than White children has been documented in prior research (e.g., Hofferth & Sandberg, 2001). These racial/ethnic differences have not been investigated fully, however. Past research tends to rely on economic or cultural explanations, often citing research findings focusing on working-class racial/ethnic minority children, to interpret these racial/ethnic differences. As Dow (2019) and Vallejo (2012) noted, economic perspectives do not help understand racial/ethnic differences that exist within the same SES. As Lee and Zhou (2015) pointed out, cultural explanations tend to rely on essentialist notions of ethnic values, which are not useful in understanding intergroup similarities across racial/ethnic minorities, like our findings for screen media or outside play. In this article, we attempted to shift the focus from economic or cultural explanations to racial/ethnic stratification in theorizing and interpreting racial/ethnic differences in children’s activities that exist at the same SES. Critical race perspectives help investigate not only the processes through which racial/ethnic stratification reproduces economic inequalities across racial/ethnic groups but also alternative strategies that racial/ethnic minority families may find to improve their children’s chances to survive in the racially-stratified society (Collins, 2000). Past qualitative research suggests that minority parents may perceive consequences of the same action—like playing outside—differently for their children than for White children and thereby may discourage their children from participating in that action or activity (Dow, 2016a; Elliott & Aseltine, 2013). Racial/ethnic minority parents may see screen media in a more positive light than White parents as tools for multicultural socialization of their children; benefits of exposure to ethnic culture through media on racial/ethnic minority children’s development of healthy self-concepts are documented (Mora & Kang, 2016; Ramasubramanian, Doshi, & Saleem, 2017). Future quantitative research on racial/ethnic differences in education-related parenting should examine whether mainstream views of optimal parenting and children’s activities would always apply to racial/ethnic minority communities in the same ways.

We find that overall, Black and Asian parents are more likely than White parents to have their children engaged in academic activities during the summer after kindergarten. Latino parents are less likely than other parents to help children study—for example, practice numbers and letters—but they are more likely to have their children tutored than White parents. Our finding that SES and other characteristics equal, Black parents are more engaged in their children’s academic work than White parents and that Black children are more likely than White children to be engaged in academic activities outside school is consistent with other research findings examining school-age or teenage children (Buchmann et al., 2010; Ho et al., 2019; Li & Hamlin, 2019). We need more research that investigates this paradox—Black students appear to study outside the classroom more, yet, they have lower educational achievements than White students—to point out how to help increase Black students’ academic success. It is perplexing that research focusing on early childhood tends to produce the opposite conclusion: the Black–White gap in children’s cognitive skills that emerges before kindergarten is in part because Black parents read to their young children less often than White parents (see the literature review in Gibbs & Downey, 2020). Many of these studies, however, did not fully examine racial differences in parenting after controlling for SES and other characteristics. Little research has examined racial/ethnic differences in parenting across different children’s developmental stages. Future research is warranted to investigate racial/ethnic differences in learning-related parenting at the same SES, in relation to educational institutions such as early childhood education and K-12 school environments, across children’s developmental stages.

The current analysis of children’s summer activities has limitations that future research should improve. Measures of children’s summer activities can be improved. In the present analysis, only 25% of parents reported that their kindergarteners spent time attending summer camps. It is unclear whether this is due to the wording used in the questionnaire. There are other types of organized activities that children may participate, such as swimming lessons, but these were not asked in the survey. More detailed information regarding summer camps would be helpful to understand what children do during the summer. For outside play, reading, and studying with parents, time diary data, rather than the survey questions used in the current analysis, would be better at capturing how children spend their time during a summer break. In particular, the current survey grouped “three to six times a week” to be one response, though reading six days a week is very different from reading only three days a week. Measures of key background characteristics of parents can be improved, too. For example, we measured primary parents’ employment status in the spring of kindergarten (i.e., before the summer) because their employment status during the summer was unavailable. Some parents who were employed in the spring could be not working during the summer. In terms of understanding racial/ethnic differences in parenting, as we already mentioned, we did not have measures of racism-related parenting. We focused on the primary parent’s race/ethnicity, but a small percentage of children have two parents who have different racial/ethnic backgrounds. Multiracial parents and parents who identified themselves as Native American were excluded from the current analysis.

Examination of racial/ethnic disparities in what children do in their leisure time, especially when schools are not in session, provides a unique window into understanding racial/ethnic differences in parenting. Although economic disparities across racial/ethnic families are important to address, focusing solely on economic explanations ignores racial/ethnic stratification that exists at the same SES, a key source of inequalities that racial/ethnic minority parents are concerned about in preparing their children for their future success. Future research that incorporates insights from critical race perspectives to theorize and interpret racial/ethnic differences in parenting and children’s activities is warranted to extend the knowledge of how racial/ethnic inequality affects children’s educational and social development.

Footnotes

Declaration of conflicting interests

The author(s) declared no potential conflicts of interest with respect to the research, authorship, and/or publication of this article.

Funding

The author(s) declared the following potential conflicts of interest with respect to the research, authorship, and/or publication of this article: This research is supported by the Center for Family and Demographic Research, Bowling Green State University, which has core funding from the Eunice Kennedy Shriver National Institute of Child Health and Human Development (P2CHD050959).

ORCID iDs

Kei Nomaguchi

Amira Allen

Note

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