A workshop by Julie Miller and Tiffany Cornett Information obtained and adapted from: True Parenting: How to Foster Deeper Family Ties and a Harmonious Home (True Success Book) By Kathy Hayward

 Understanding your own personality will help you to understand your child’s personality and behaviors.  Complete the quiz provided to discover your personality color.  Fill in the follow along worksheet for this session.

 You now have your personality color.  You may have a secondary color if your score was within one or two points from your main color.  If this occurs, you will have a dominate and a recessive color to create a combined personality color.

 Acts on a moments notice  Sees life as a game of chance  Needs stimulation/freedom /excitement/values action  Natural leader  Troubleshooter  Performer  Bored easily (with careers and routine/structure)  Seek relationships with people who share interests.  Enjoy giving gifts that bring joy.  Learn by doing and experiencing.  Competitive

Strength Keys to personal success  Need freedom to take immediate action.  Zest for life  Desire to test the limits.  Prideful in being skilled in a variety of areas.  Master negotiator.  Hands on approach to life.  Impulse to really live  Testing the limits  Need for variation  Excitement and light- heartedness  Spontaneous  Being able to react in a crisis  Love for tools  Charming, witty and fun  Waiting is painful

 Responsible  Strength  Respect for authority  Establish and maintain policies, procedures and schedules.  Sense of wrong and right  Like organization, dependability, management and detail  Need to be useful and to belong  Backbone of a group  Values home, family, status, security and tradition  Seek relationships that ensure predictability  Caring, concerned and practical

Strengths-Duty Keys to personal success  Value order  Cherish traditions of home and family  Provide for and support the structure of society  Steadfastness and loyalty  Generous  Parental by nature  Makes sure everyone does right  Generous  Work ethic  Ceremony  Sense of history  Dignity, culture  Value order  Home and family  Establishing organization

 Compassionate  Encouraging  Would give the shirt of their backs for another  Nurturing and harmonizing  Values art and expression  Desire to lead so others can lead a more significant life.  Seek harmonious relationships  Enjoys romance  Imaginative/difficult to fit in in school  Sensitive to discord or rejection  Responds to encouragement  Can believe and think outside of ones comfort zone

Strength-AuthenticityKeys to success  Express inner me  Value honesty  Dramatic  Spiritual  Sincere  Sympathetic  Nurturing  Facilitator of human potential  Authenticity as a standard  Seeking reality  Devotion  Cultivating potential in others  Sensitive to subtlety  Seeking harmony  Needs to be listened to when needed.

 Conceptual  Investigative mind  Questions everything  Independent  Likes things that require vision  Needs proof to believe  Values intelligence  Enjoy relationships with shared interests  Head over heart mindset  Work is play  Drawn to challenges in career  Like to develop models  Does not linger on things already accomplished

Strength-conceptualKeys to success  Thinks projects through  Investigates all options  Values intelligence  Self-motivated  Focused on goals  Natural non-conformist  Likes problem solving, designing, ingenuity and change  Self driven  Often seen as an outsider  Intelligence is prized and seen as its own reward  Appear wise beyond their years  Works well to delegate once the idea is perfected within  Investigative

 Colors can become complimentary and conflict  Green and Orange compliment each other  Gold and Blue compliment each other  Green and Blue conflict  Gold and Orange conflict  Why might this be?

OrangeGreen  Spontaneous  Quick to action  Needs change  Work hard to have fun  Thinks through things that orange may miss  Likes to work quick yet efficient  Willing to move on to change when the action is mastered  Work is fun to them

GoldBlue  Likes structure  Needs rules to the game  Responsible  Organized  Values family  Needs validation for a job well done  Needs structure to maintain free spirit  Open to rules and willing to work in a group  Brings creativity to structure  Values family  Nurturing and can value the gold’s work

OrangeGold  Freedom is valued  Spontaneous actions are fun  Quick to make decisions  Don’t mind bending the rules  Value time away from family to seek individuality  Structure is key  Change and spontaneity create anxiety without planning  Need time to evaluate the situation and weigh each option  Don’t like breaking rules  Value family and together time

GreenBlue  Value intelligence and education  Need proof  Decisions are made easily and with reason  Do not mind conflict and seek chances to demonstrate knowledge  Closed personally and need close relationships to share  Avoid drama  Value individuality and art  Can believe from faith  Difficult to make decisions because too many factors are considered  Do not like conflict and will avoid it  Open and willing to share  Dramatic

 What color is your child?  Do you see personality conflict or compatibility?  How would personality impact the problems you currently see in you and your child’s relationship?  What color is your co-parent’s personality?  Do you see compatibility or conflict with your co-parents relationship with your child?

 Next session ◦ Identify your child’s personality color ◦ Identify where you and your child conflict or are compatible in personality ◦ Identify your parenting color ◦ Learn how your parenting color and personality color work together ◦ Identify techniques on how to work with a child of a compatible/conflicting color to your parenting color.

 Fill out the parenting color quiz to discover you parenting color  Use the follow along worksheet to identify your color.  Analyze how your personality and parenting color interact.  Do you have a recessive color?

 Do not endorse a “right style” nor compare  Separate well from children when needed  Allow children to search for independence and learn by exploration  Comfortable allowing others to join in the parenting role  Believe in a hands on approach to problem solving with children  Willing to try new and creative things to fix problems  Direct methods of communication-no “sugar coating”  Messy is ok  Expect children to do their best in what they pursue

 Caretaker  Responsible, hard working and dedicated to family  Important to do the right thing as a parent  Family members should keep their word  Task minder  Work before play  Family should be organized  My way or the highway  Need appreciation  Want to be viewed as good parents  Show love by “doing”  Tend to “do it ourselves” mentality

 Nurture family needs  Communication and emotional connectedness is valued  Devoted parent  Put LOTS of energy into pleasing the family putting others before self  Sensitive to rejection  Prefer democratic discipline  Want children to be happy with their lives  Warn, affectionate and home centered  Enthusiastic and dramatic spokesperson for the family  Role of “friend in need”  Can be inconsistent  Torn between what needs to be done and what feels right

 Encourage intellectual potential  Want children to have initiative  Want children to fulfill their potential  Encourage investigation and question things that interest their children  Dislike wasting time on the mundane  Explain reasons behind decisions and influence other family members  Often “lecture”  Logical and objective style of parenting  Achievement is the reward  Expect family members to at least try  May not praise easily

 Investigate ways to parent individual children.  Investigate ways to approach situations for individual children.  Identify ways to co-parent with another person to your child’s needs.

 Allow for choices to be made ◦ We do not always co-parent with someone of the same color. ◦ In this case, parenting decisions may become conflicting and difficult to understand the others perspective.  Consider their desire for change and spontaneity. ◦ Break large tasks into chunks ◦ Create fun and energizing ways to approach mundane tasks

 Use their competitive edge to your advantage ◦ Create rewards for tasks well done ◦ Praise and celebrate when a task is completed Conflicting Gold Parent: ◦ Understand they want independence and will test your rules. Give them options within your rules to allow them to make decisions. ◦ Your need for structure may be tested. Create a structure that will keep them in the “bumper bowling” mode of parenting. They can roll in the lane, but you established the bumpers so the ball will not go in the gutter.

 Create structure and guidelines for this child. ◦ Charts, reward systems and rules for tasks are preferred  Praise the child for a job well done when task is completed. ◦ Gold children are people pleasers. They want to know their actions were noticed  Allow the gold child to have a place in the family. ◦ Gold children like to belong and value family. Giving responsibility will help the gold child to have a sense or belonging.

 Create activities to allow for the gold child to plan. Yet, help them understand when the plans don’t go as scheduled. ◦ Vacation activities, parties, shopping trips, menu’s and other items. ◦ Discuss how they will respond if the plan goes other than how they planned. Conflicting Orange: Understand that your child becomes anxious with spontaneity. Neatness and organization is prized with them. They may want to spend time with family having structure around meal times, holidays and other family oriented activities.

 Blue children tend to have their head in the clouds.  Allow for creativity and recognize their expression  Don’t give too much attention to the “drama” while recognizing their need to be heard. ◦ Discuss difficult topics with the understanding they become emotional easily.  Help them to understand a healthy balance of giving to others and giving beyond themselves. Conflicting Green: Understand that your rash approach can be harsh to the blue child. Approach situations with a warm understanding and open mind to their feelings. Praise and listen to the blue child with the understanding that they value your opinion and presence.

 Are often seen as “loners” ◦ Give them opportunities to work with other children. Understand when they feel uncomfortable  Will question everything and plead their case ◦ Need to be heard, leaving the problem at “because I said so” will not do for them  Tend to use their intellect to get their way  Have a hard time understanding without facts  Need thorough explanation for discipline

 Nagging is their kryptonite ◦ Develop a system where you can request actions from the child without having to “nag”  Allow them to have space within reason ◦ They value their alone time ◦ Alone time allows for thinking and recharging Conflicting Blue: Blue parents often want to smother the green child with love. Allow thinking time, opportunities for independence and recognize achievements. Green children conceptualize and rationalize. Create a form of communication that is health and works for you and the green child.

 Understanding how your child approaches and sees life will aid you in your parenting style.  Not all children will be parented the same.  Each child is individual and needs will vary from child to child, age to age and situation to situation.  Parenting is not A+B=C. You might start with A and B only to equal PURPLE!!

Hayward, K. (2001). True colors parenting: How to foster deeper family ties and a harmonious home.(pp ). True Colors International.