As a school counselor, I really wanted to like this book, but was left unimpressed after reading it. The rhymes were awkward and included many references that kids will not understand. There are many books about uniqueness for kids and I felt like this book was trying a bit too hard. ( )

Although I like the idea of a book that helps children learn that being different is ok, everyone doesn't have to be the same, I didn't like the title of the book or the use of the word "lame" It works well in the rhyme, but it seems to give permission to use a negative word to describe opinions of others. Some of the references and words are really not very understandable by young children. Usually they don't really know about the Walk of Fame, or the NFL draft. Exploit your uniqueness? I don't think 4 year olds really would know what that means. The idea of helping children realize that everyone is unique and that is good, is a good topic. I just would like to see it handled in a little more sensitive and appropriate way. ( )

When it comes to kids being different, I am all about helping them to fit in, be accepted and do what ever they can. This book follows along with that, let's fight against bullies and set up these kids to succeed. The concept or moral of the book is great, but the execution leaves a little room for improvement. I was wanting this to be a read aloud book, I found that some of the rhymes did't really rhyme that good, and some of the references would be lost or need to be explained. Both of these cases would loose some of the cadence of the book and possibly loose the books intention as well as the attention of the kids. I still like the concept and the moral of the story and am thankful to LibrayThing for the reviewer copy to read. ( )

When I first read this book to my 4 year old I thought "eh, it's ok." He seemed to enjoy it. He liked the rhyming and the illustrations but it didn't make it into our high rotation of books that he likes to read.

However the other day, weeks after we had read the book, he says to me, "some people have marks on their face and that's okay."

It took us some back and forth to figure out what he was talking about but eventually he went and grabbed this book and showed me the birth mark on the face of one of the characters. Something about this books stuck with him and was teaching him an important lesson about people being different and acceptance even though I didn't remember it was even there. ( )

cute book. nice rhyme. ( )