Parenting Pointers: Colorblind Quiz

Leah Harper Bowron recently wrote Colorblind: A Novel, which tells the story of Lisa, a 6th grade girl who dealt with bullies and racism in the 1960s. Fifty years later, the issue of bullying is still in the forefront of the news and in parent conversations (think Big Little Lies) every day, and our kids are dealing with it at school, on the playground, and especially on social media. They have developed a new online quiz (because who doesn’t love online quizzes?) for middle schoolers up to adults: "What Kind of Friend are You? Take the Colorblind Quiz!" Great opportunity for discussion between parents and kids.   
The quiz has 10 questions, each with 5 multiple choice answers. The results will tell each quiz taker which category of friend they fall into (Everyone’s Buddy, True Blue, Sidelines Observer, Loner, and Bully), their strengths, their weaknesses and how to be a better friend. The results also reveal which character in Colorblind they are most like. It’s a lot of fun and has a positive message for each person who takes it. It can be taken in 30 seconds!   
  

ABOUT COLORBLIND 
Schoolyard bullies teased sixth grader Lisa Parker because of the way her nose looked. Lisa would often develop a stomachache and check out of school to escape the bullies. Until sixth grade teacher Miss Annie Loomis came to Wyatt. Miss Loomis just happened to be the first African American at Wyatt, and Lisa loved her English class. Now, when the bullies teased Lisa, she would stay in school so that she could be in Miss Loomis’ class. Yet something terrible happened that would change Lisa and Miss Loomis forever. Racism reared its ugly head at Wyatt, and now Lisa was not the only victim of the bullies’ teasing. Would Miss Loomis endure the bullies’ racist taunts? 

ABOUT THE AUTHOR  
Leah Harper Bowron is a lawyer and James Joyce scholar from Birmingham, Alabama. She has studied at Randolph-Macon Women’s College, University of Alabama and University of Edinburgh, and earned her M.A. at the University of Alabama-Birmingham and her J.D. at University of Alabama School of Law. Her article “Coming of Age in Alabama: Ex parte Devine Abolishes the Tender Years Presumption” was published in the Alabama Law Review. She recently lectured on Joyce’s novel Ulysses at the University of London and the Universite de Reims. She lives in Dothan, Alabama.