Wednesday, June 03, 2009

The Parenting Belt Ranking System--a start

If parenting were a martial art with belt rankings like karate, what tests would we experience for each level?

Here are some of my ideas, organized by challenge category. There are plenty more categories, of course. I welcome, and will post, your suggestions. I'd especially appreciate input from parents who have more experience than I do with babies and teenagers.

ILLNESS
White: Child has fever
Yellow: Child has cold
Green: Child has vomiting or diarrhea
Brown: Multiple children, and not all are sick
Black: Multiple children, not all are sick, and you are sick yourself

INJURY
White: Child sustains injury with bleeding, tears, blaming, and mess
Yellow: Child has surgery
Green: Child has allergic reaction, head injury, animal bite, or other trauma
Brown: Green belt test with added challenge of parenting other children at the same time
Black: Brown belt test with added challenge of children not speaking the same language you do

SCHOOL
White: Homework assignment needs completing on short notice
Yellow: Homework assignment conflicts with home culture
Green: Parent-teacher conference
Brown: Volunteering in child's classroom
Black: Volunteering to introduce your home culture to the class

SHOPPING
White: Grocery store with one child and a budget
Yellow: White belt challenge with a time limit
Green: Yellow belt challenge with more than one child
Brown: Green belt challenge in a toy store, all kids are boys
Black: Brown belt challenge with at least one girl

TRAVEL
White: Child is awake in car for more than 20 minutes
Yellow: White belt challenge plus child is carsick
Green: Flight, boat, or train ride of more than an hour
Brown: Green belt test plus added challenge of multiple children or illness
Black: Brown belt test with both added challenges plus not speaking a shared language

1 comments:

Shelley said...

All this, and tech support, too?!

You're a black belt for sure. Am tweeting it out to the crowd for more input. Bet the black belt for parents of teenagers has a cellphone category...