Ever wonder how your parenting style affects your children?
Today’s lesson is on parenting styles and how they affect children.
Technically speaking, i.e. according to parenting expert Barbara Coloroso, author of Kids Are Worth It, there are three different types of parenting styles:
BRICKWALL, BACKBONE, and JELLYFISH.
The author hasn’t met me yet.
Ms. Coloroso applies her parenting models to all sorts of situations parents encounter from toilet training to getting your kids out of jail.
To determine what type of parent you are, read the definitions (mine) of each of the parenting styles, below, and answer the multiple choice questions which follow….
A brickwall parent is a great big pain in the Ashtabula Star Beacon. S/he doesn’t have time to parent and therefore rules with an iron fist. A kid with brickwall parents grows up to be:
a) mean and grumpy
b) the leader of a Third World country
c) Robin Williams
d) a braille translator
Jellyfish parents are spineless and whiny. They provide very little structure, are permissive and, pretty much afraid of their own children. A child of jellyfish parents grows up to be:
a) spineless and whiny
b) a follower
c) Robin (as in ‘Batman and…’)
d) an odor tester (ewwww).
Next we have backbone parents. This type of parent provides healthy boundaries, a stable home base, freedom to grow, and little if any electronics. Backbone parents are excellent listeners. They ask questions. They also make time for laughter and play, as long as it doesn’t involve electronics. Kids with backbone parents develop a strong moral center. They grow up to be:
a) resilient
b) dedicated to the pursuit of happiness
c) Lady Gaga
d) not very good with electronics.
Finally there’s the Tasmanian Mama, as depicted above in a self-portrait of the artist as a crazy lady. This type of parent (of which there is only one, hence she is the worst!) vacillates between all three parenting styles, depending on the mood in which she is swinging at any moment in time/space reality. (Be afraid for her children for they know not what to expect. Ever.)
Children of the Tasmanian Mama grow up to:
a) also have multiple personalities and wild mood swings which can sometimes cause Mercury to become stuck in retrograde.
b) defy Myers-Briggs testing methodologies, even when the tester is Michele Woodward (who, by the way, is in denial about not being Superwoman).
c) have no artistic talent even when they are certain they do
d) feel lucky to have made it to ‘grown up’.
Hand in your answers promptly and I’ll grade them when I’m in a better mood. Please be advised that I’d like your responses to be neat, well thought out, and if you like you can include your own artwork, but make sure you color inside the lines and whatever you do, do NOT copy mine.
