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ALL KINDS OF FRIENDS, EVEN GREEN! by Ellen B. Senisi

ALL KINDS OF FRIENDS, EVEN GREEN!

by Ellen B. Senisi & photographed by Ellen B. Senisi

Pub Date: Nov. 1st, 2002
ISBN: 1-890627-35-6

First graders in Moses’s class are asked to write about a friend in this didactic story about children with special needs. Moses, who is wheelchair-bound, muses about his many friends, including classmates, parents, teachers, a babysitter, and pets; he decides to write about Zaki, an iguana “with special needs,” who is missing her back toes. He explains that Zaki has learned to do things differently because of her disability. “She’s like me,” says Moses. “ . . . even though she looks different than me, something inside her is the same as me.” The author of Just Kids (1998), an award-winning title about kids with disabilities, again presents cheerful color photos of children in an inclusion class. Here the forced story line and awkward layout of text and photos detract from her admirable intent. She concludes with a word about disabilities, more about Moses, and a word about iguanas as pets. She states, “Iguanas don’t make any noise and they don’t bite.” She may be right about the noise part, but they certainly do bite. This title may be useful for sensitizing children to those with special needs, but it could have been so much better. (Picture book. 5-8)