Many educational programs that incorporate ethnic minority students’ culture into the curriculum rely on a fragmented view of culture. These perspectives emphasize symbolic and ideational aspects of culture. As such, they ignore students’ economic conditions that influence schooling. This study provides detailed data from two Latino households to show that a deeper understanding of students’ lives requires an investigation of household members’ survival and economic practices. It also shows that household studies provide a deeper understanding of students’ culture and daily practices that cannot be obtained from reading books, as is common in many educational programs.
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