I Am Different! Can You Find Me? by Manjla Padmanabhan
Review by Chris Singer
About the author:
- Manjula Padmanabhan is an artist, illustrator, cartoonist, playwright and novelist. She has illustrated 21 children’s books, and has had a longrunning cartoon strip, Suki, in the Sunday Observer and later the Pioneers. Her play, Harvest, was selected from 1470 entries in 76 countries for the Onassis Prize in 1997.
About the book:
On every page of this inviting book, young readers will discover one item that’s unlike all the rest—a different color, a different shape, reversed from left to right, or just asleep when others are awake! Paired with each picture puzzle is the question “Can you find me?” in one of 16 languages. Children will have fun trying out Hebrew, Arabic, French, Swahili, and American Sign Language. And they may find that “different” is just as nice as “same.”
My take on the book:
This wonderful picture book is clever, entertaining and full of teachable moments about the unique differences in all of us. Each page has a bright and colorful puzzle which challenges each reader to find the one thing in it which is different. Complementing each picture is the question, ” Can you find me?” in one of 16 languages. Young readers will enjoy learning how to say the phrase in other languages as well as learning about the origin of some familiar English words (giraffe, ukelele, candy and more).
This book is truly a treasure for teachers and librarians looking for engaging books to share with young readers. The book features an answer key to the puzzles as well as some discussion about the diversity of languages. Just a side note, but many of the puzzles may be quite challenging for younger children. Fortunately, there’s really not a wrong answer for each puzzle as many of the pictures feature differences depending on the viewpoint and perspective of each individual reader.
For more about this book, visit this link to read Manjla Padmanabhan’s blog on the Global Fund For Children’s ‘On The Road’ blog.
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