This book is a little different than the rest of the potty training books. This book is aimed to help the family cope with and understand a strong-willed child who is fighting the potty training process. It would be most helpful for a child who goes poo in the wrong place on purpose or is too vocal with their potty words.

It’s true, this book is called Potty Poo-Poo Wee-Wee. I got this book, along with many other potty training books, to help my youngest daughter who just turned three to learn about the training process. It turned out that this book is for a more advanced potty training stage than where we are. I personally thought the book was wonderful and we'll be checking the book out again should we be dealing with these issues next year.

The story is about a little dinosaur that probably represents an older 3-year-old or 4-year-old. In the book his name is Littlesaurus. On each page Littlesaurus makes a pile. My three-year-old instantly recognized it as poo. This is dinosaur poo mind you, so we have a large pile stacked perfectly with a line coming up to represent the smell.

Daddysaurus gives Littlesaurus a potty chair and tells the boy what it is. The chair is blue and looks like a bowl. The Littlesaus thinks it’s funny and sings, “Potty Poo-Poo Wee-Wee”. The daddy says, “Shush. It’s rude to say it so loud.”

The dinosaur is not ashamed of his poo and stands almost like he’s proud of it. On each page one of his friends or family members approaches him and he sings the words. The list includes: Dad, mom, aunt, uncle, granny, teacher, big sister, friend, and next door neighbor. Each of the individuals tells Littlesaurs simply, "That’s rude." The illustrations and wording indicates to me that the author is saying that both putting the poo in the wrong place and the words that are chosen are inappropriate.

Eventually Grannysaurs tells Littlesaurs that his dad use to do it too so Littlesaurus has field day with that which makes the Daddysaurs mad and tells the Littlesaurs that he doesn’t care if Littlesaurs ever uses the potty so Littlesaurs uses it just in spite.

When Littlesaurus was sitting on the potty everyone gathered around and cheered and Littlesaurus had his opportunity to say, “That’s rude!” The ending was really cute and all the kids thought the ending was funny.

Illustrations
I was happy with the watercolor illustrations. The words are in large dark block print. The pages are wide and the entire page is filled with color. The dinosaurs are different colors (such as pink, orange, red or brown) and are ugly but not scary-looking. The illustrations represent the body language and emotions well. The child would be able to understand the story just by looking at the pictures alone.

General Information
Retail: $9.99
Ages: 2-4
Publisher: Candlewick Press
Copyright: 2005
Author: Colin McNaughton

Overall
We are just getting started on the potty task and the behaviors in this book don’t really apply to my daughter. My 12-year-old and 6-year-old insisted that they sit in on the book so that they could hear it again. They love it! It was clear that my little one is too young to understand why the older kids think this book is so funny and interesting.

This book is most certainly recommended for the child who is capable but refuses to go in the right place or likes to make a spectacle out of the process. I think the lessons are very clear and making the character a dinosaur rather than a child really helps to be more lighthearted and open-minded about the subject.

The dino in the story is a boy but I think the fact that only poo helps illustrate that we're not talking about accidents and can apply to both boys and girls. Still, this does seem more like a story for a boy rather than a girl.

Recommended: Yes