Children learn the words of their native language(s) from interactions with their caregivers. Although previous research has found that the language children hear during those interactions predicts vocabulary outcomes, few studies have investigated how qualitative features of social interactions work together to affect children's vocabulary…

This article examines a rural public school with an increasingly racially diverse and working-class student body as a site where inclusion and exclusion were negotiated based on popular beliefs about culture. I look at how the interpretation of particular behaviors as indicative of a cultural regard for the value of formal education created…