Girls Use the Potty!

We just finished potty training our 22 month old daughter and this book was the one that worked the BEST for us. PROS (there are so many, so I'll just start from the beginning and move through the book) - First page there is a place to write your daughter's name, as in "This book belongs to..." My daughter can recognize her name and I wrote it with a sharpie in large capital letters in the space provided before giving her the book. When she opened it up and saw that her name was there, she was absolutely thrilled! This book is special just for her! Hooray! - The next page has a note to parents that tells you exactly how to use the book and the sticker chart that comes with it. This is really helpful. - It comes with it's OWN STICKER CHART AND STICKERS! Yes, you can make your own, and buy stickers. Yes you can buy a chart with stickers on Amazon for like $14+, but honestly, having it all in one place was AMAZING! We purchased the paperback version and it was less than $5! You can't get a better deal anywhere. And yes, some people don't want to use stickers and with some children stickers don't work. But there is only one place in the text that mentions "I get a star" and it's not in sticker form, so if your method eschews this kind of thing, you can just cut out the chart and stickers and put them aside and your child will never know that they're missing. ------ More about the sticker chart - We used the stickers and the sticker chart. Honestly, even though my daughter really likes stickers, she is still too young to necessarily understand the concept of a sticker on a chart as a reward (22 months old). However, using the sticker chart was helpful in creating a visual display of her success. Each day we would count (I would count - she can only count to 2) the number of stars on the chart and I would give her lots of praise and love, celebrating her accomplishments. There are places for 40 stars, 4 rows of 10. At the end of these rows is a spot for a special round sticker featuring the teddy bear from the story. It goes from Star, to Superstar, to Megastar, to Big Girl! There are 80 star stickers included, so for each star you put on the chart, you can also give one to your daughter (to wear or do whatever with). With regard to the big round stickers, there is only 1 extra of the Big Girl sticker. In the beginning we made putting a sticker on the chart part of the potty routine after drying hands. However, pretty soon this got to be too much of a thing, and we dropped it altogether with me just putting the sticker on the chart while she was washing her hands. Still, as noted above, the chart was most useful as a visualization of our daughter's success, both for her and for us to keep track of how she was doing. - The story itself is comprised of text, captions, and photographs. This makes the narrative very versatile. Parents can modify what they focus on and how they read each page. The photographs also help make the story more real for the child. They see another child doing something and they want to do it too. Children of potty training age innately want to do what other children are doing. The little girl in the story serves as a model for your daughter to follow. - The story is wonderful for modeling positive potty-training behavior. It follows a little girl who is potty-training. Unlike other books, the girl is only in diapers in ONE photo. After that it's all undies and potties and potty-training. The little girl is excited and enthusiastic with a big smile on her face throughout the ENTIRE book. - There are NO NEGATIVE associations with the potty or potty training. Don't even put those ideas in your child's head or reinforce them through stories. This book is all about the joy and fun of potty training. - It starts with the fun stuff - underpants! different kinds of potties! The lead character says "The pink one is for me!" (this is very different from some other books that say - this potty is NOT for me). - The story first goes through step-by-step the potty routine with the teddy. The little girl teaches her teddy to use the potty. One review said that this book was only useful if you're potty training a teddy bear. Clearly that reviewer hasn't read much literature on potty training. Books like Teri Crane's best-seller, "Potty Train Your Child in Just One Day" advocate FIRST having your child teach a doll or stuffed animal how to use the potty. In doing so they go through the process of learning the steps before they have to do it themselves. This makes the learning process easier. Our daughter absolutely loved her Potty Training with Elmo DVD and yes, she did put her stuffed Elmo on the potty. But she also learned how to use the potty herself by doing so. Ask anyone who has potty trained a child and whether it was part of their method or not, I bet their child tried to put their doll or stuffed animal on the potty. That's why dolls are important toys for both boys and girls, because children learn about the world around them by observing and modeling behavior. - This is one of the FEW potty books that actually has a LEGITIMATE STEP-BY-STEP potty routine - WITH NUMBERS! 1. Introduce teddy to the potty, 2. Tell teddy to listen to his body and when he needs to go, sits on the potty and try, 3. Teddy pees in the potty! "That means you used the potty right- just look inside and see." Excitement and proof of achievement!, 4. Wiping with toilet paper, 5. Wash hands, 6. Dry hands (and "have a little kiss! x") Yay! - Throughout the step-by-step process, the little girl is encouraging her teddy with positive, supportive messages "Big girls use the potty. I bet you can do it, too!" , "see what you can do" , "You can do it if you try!" It's not about being able to do it or not doing it, it's about trying. - After the step-by-step there is the requisite page addressing accidents. I really like the way this book does it. Instead of the message, "You had an accident. It's ok" - which is the message most potty books have - the message in THIS book is that each day is different, sometimes you may have an accident, and some days you might not have any, but "The most important thing is to do your best and try." This is PERFECT! It lets your child know, without actually condoning or encouraging it, that accidents are ok and that they happen and are a natural part of potty-training. But it also ends with the message that ideally you should try to not have accidents, and the most important thing is that you're trying to learn how to use the potty. - The next page has the little girl going through the steps herself, but in an abbreviated form. So, again, for the reviews that said it didn't show the girl using the potty, they need to re-read the book. There are 5 photos on this page: 1. the little girl sitting on the potty, 2. holding toilet paper, 3. washing her hands, 4. drying her hands, 5. getting a star. Each photo has a caption too. And, as noted above regarding modeling behavior, the text reads "Now I will try it, Teddy. If you can do it, so can I!" - The final page ends with a positive message that the child is saying good-bye to diapers because now she knows just what to do (she has learned the steps necessary for using the potty). She can use the potty "just like big girls do!" Hooray for becoming a big girl! NEUTRAL/CONS - You do need to do some work before giving this to your child. To get the most out of this book, a parent or guardian needs to read the instructions, probably give it a good read-through, write their child's name on the first page, carefully remove the sticker chart from the middle (use staple removers to pry up the staples and then to push them back down), and cut out the sticker pages from the front and back of the book with scissors. - The book is VERY pink. We try to avoid this color when possible - not because there's anything wrong with pink, pink is awesome, it's just a lighter shade of red, but there is a whole spectrum of amazing colors, and "girl things" do not have to be pink. IN SUM This is absolutely the BEST potty training book we've found - and we've read a bunch (at least 10). This book is not only a book that you can read to your daughter while she sits on the potty, but it is also a book designed to TEACH your daughter how to use the potty. It is designed to have your daughter WANT to do the things that the little girl is doing - saying good-bye to diapers, getting undies, getting a potty, learning how to use the potty, using the potty, and becoming a big girl! It provides instructions for parents on how to use the book and also comes with stickers and a sticker chart. It follows a method demonstrated to work by child development and child psychology experts. It worked for us (in conjunction with a modified potty-training method from Jamie Glowacki's "Oh Crap! Potty Training"). Buy it New in Paper-back from Amazon (best price and you'll get the stickers and chart). You won't regret it! I HIGHLY recommend this book to all my friends who are thinking about potty training their children.

My daughter just turned 3 and we were having a hard time getting started on this potty training business. She just did NOT want to sit on the potty and when we’d put her on she’d just hold it till she had a diaper/pull-up/undies back on and would go then. So, I knew she COULD hold it and release when she wanted… my question was how to get her to do it in the potty. M&Ms (success treats) weren’t working, esp if she got one for just sitting down (she’d sit, immediately say “done!” and then ask for one - smart girl) so I decided to give this book a shot. So she wasn’t suuuper interested in the actual book. She liked seeing the big girls in their big girl undies and on the potty, and it held her attention a little at first… but after a few times she really didn’t care too much about it. But! Using the star sticker chart was a winner! We’d stick a star on the chart after any *successful* #1 or #2 in the potty and when she filled up a row she’d get a prize. It was slow to start of course, but she got the idea after a while (after getting prize 1 and then 2) and by the time we got to the last row she filled it up in 2 days! She also loved adding the stickers to the chart herself too. Yay! The book and sticker chart are super cute so for the price it’s totally worth it. I like that it comes with twice as many stickers as the chart needs so we’re using it on another chart I printed out too. It’s happening people!! She’s doing it! All in all: Cute looking book. Nicely designed sticker chart. Even tho she didn’t spend too much time with the book, i do think it helped her get the idea of this all being a normal part of big kid life. Stickers charts rock! (Sorry so long lol, I’m excited)

I bought this book when my now-3 year old was potty training and she loved it. So I bought it again now that my 2 year old is potty training. It's fun to read all about how this little girl uses the potty. The format is kind of a magazine-style with thought bubble all over the pages. Not exactly thought bubbles as much as little sentences in boxes. It's not a linear story. The format is fun. However, my biggest issue is that it comes with stickers...but not many stickers. So unless your child potty trains in a hot second, there aren't enough stickers to make it through a chart. Of course, the amount of stickers you need depends on what method you're following and how long you plan to give out stickers in exchange for poops and pees. I just take away the sticker pages and repurpose those for other things so we don't end up with a poop without a sticker reward.

This book has played a tremendous role in potty training our toddler. We started reading it probably around 15 months old. She loves reading books, especially those with images of real children. We removed the stickers because we didn't want to distract her from the main objective. We did not do sticker chart because we're trying to follow the Montessori method. We also got her the Summer flushing toilet for her potty (most realistic looking one I could find). We read this book so many times every day for months because she was so into it. We'd say hi to Molly (and she'd do yoga poses like Molly). We'd talk about different potty types and big girl underpants. We'd talk about all the different processes and got her hyped up for potty training. We officially said goodbye to diapers at the beginning of 19 months. At the recommendation of a friend, we potty trained her night time routine right from the beginning. I took a few days off work to dedicate the beginning of potty training. She was pretty consistent by month 21. Had some infrequent accidents periodically until month 25. No more accidents since month 26. Thank you so much for this book!!! Highly recommend 100%!

This book as a story is honestly meh but... my daughter was absolutely enamored by the sticker chart! I hadn't tried one because at 26 mo., she had no context for this type of reward; my elder child trained easily without one; sticker charts are not recommended by the leading potty-training author (oh cr*p! method). I put it up at her eye level by the laundry room toilet and explained how it worked. Well, she was immediately obsessed and started using the potty successfully within minutes--after two weeks of not really getting it and having tons of accidents. It has been over a year but she still regularly references the chart with pride and says how "big" she is now. I'm taking it down this weekend to add to her baby scrapbook and thought I should leave a positive review! Taking it out of the book is not complicated, just bend the staples... difficulty level: zero. 100% recommend, and it really can't hurt if you aren't having immediate success. I was surprised by the instant results with my baby.

After potty training my book-obsessed 18 month old, I have read more potty books than I knew existed. This one has been a keeper for us due to the photographs, which have been more engaging than illustrations. The storyline of the girl teaching the teddy bear before having her own potty success is not especially notable, but explains the process well enough. There are some downsides to this book, starting with the title. There is a fair amount of “big girl” language throughout, which may be counterproductive for children who are training younger or still identify with or wish for the baby role. The girl also assures the bear that “it’s okay” when it has an accident. If you are using a methodology that discourages this wording (as some children understand this to mean peeing on the floor is just fine) this might be something to reword or skip over. Reward stickers are also pictured and noted in the book; I also skipped over this as we’re not potty training with rewards. Overall, this book is potentially problematic in a number of ways, but being one of the few potty books with photographs helps outweigh the downsides. Pre-read with your methodology in mind prior to sharing and consider if you may want to reword anything.

This is a nice book. My daughter loves that it has star stickers and a nice sticker chart. The main part of the book is the girl showing the teddy bear how to use the potty, but I wish it had more step by step pictures or "directions" on using the potty. I know the parents of the girls pictured in the book probably don't want them to grow up and have all these sort of pictures of them out there in a publication, but still. It would be nice to have more photos for a toddler to read about and see that they can do these things too! The page that really gets my daughter is the "oopsy" page. It has what looks like pee on the floor and the girl telling the teddy bear that it is 'okay' to have accidents, but that you will get better at making it to the potty on time. We had a lot of fun reading while my daughter would say "Uh oh Teddy. Don't pee on the floor. You need to pee in the potty!" :) At least it drove that lesson home. All in all, a good book. The sticker chart is a nice incentive.

Starting the process of potty training with my granddaughter who is 2 1/2 and this book is perfect for her to read while potting, as well as for me to read to her for expectation. This was a great purchase.

War nUn doch etwas früh für unsere kleine. Jedoch ist das Buch echt toll und macht in der Zukunft sicher Spaß für Groß und Klein. Das mit den Stickern ist eine gute Idee.

The book is just ok, but the stars really helped train my baby. She was so fascinated by the star concept that she religiously started using the seat.

All the pages came out of the centre

Best of the potty training books I’ve purchased. Real photos that are numbered and demonstrate the steps of using the potty. It is the teddy bear who is learning to use the potty, was his hands, etc. Reward sticker chart included. Very nice! Uses real terminology rather than repeating “potty” over and over for “pee” and “poo”. Highly recommend for introducing the steps of using the potty from start to finish.

+ cute and engaging - very Western, not so clear for young toddlers to really understand potty