YOU ARE AWESOME

Funny, kind, brave…this book’s message to kids is that they can be anything.

Each spread shows a child doing something they enjoy, such as making someone laugh, creating a work of art, or helping with chores. The words “You can be…” are at the top of each page in a section of solid-color border that frames the cartoon-style double-page illustration. Each image features a child embodying the adjective they accompany, which is printed in bold, all-capital black type within the illustrated frame. A white child with glasses reads in a caregiver’s lap; the text reads: “You can be…CLEVER.” A black child with a determined grin and puffy pigtails pulls a younger child in a wagon; the text reads: “You can be…STRONG.” This predictable pattern along with the emphatic lines and bold colors will appeal to toddlers and even babies. This is a great read-aloud for talking about personality, temperament, and emotions, but as only positive qualities and attributes are shared, it’s not a full exploration of the emotional-literacy spectrum. The pairing of intellectual attainment with white children who wear glasses plays into stereotypes. In a disappointing tableau, one of these children is depicted in the foreground, with tidy hair and a bow tie, listening attentively as an adult reads aloud while two other children in the background, one a child of color, display preschooler-appropriate wiggles.

A (mostly) playful discovery of the awesome qualities that children can notice in themselves and others.