I Am, I Can, I Will: You Are Special (Tape 1)
Artist: Fred Rogers
Date: 1979
Format: Cassette
Label: Hubbard
Series: I Am, I Can, I Will
Catalog: 000-8695
Running Time: Approximately 13:00
Copyright © 1975 Family Communications, Inc.
Transcription
Do you like ice cream? If you do, what kind of ice cream do you like? Chocolate? Vanilla? Strawberry? Or maybe you like the taste of a fancy flavor like Jamocha Almond Fudge.
Can you imagine that you’re eating ice cream right now? It’s cold and creamy. Maybe you don’t even like ice cream at all. Different people like different things. We’re all different. It’s much more than the things you like that make you my friend. It’s you as a person that makes you special to me.
[Sings You Are Special]
Yes, you are a special person and our being different helps make each one of us special. There are many many ways that people are different. Some people are older than others. Some are stronger than others. Some people have straight hair. Some have curly hair.
Are you a boy or a girl? I used to think that you got born and then you turned into a girl or a boy. But now I know that if you’re a boy, you were born a boy. And if you’re a girl, you were born a girl. Each one of us is different and each one of us is fancy.
[Sings Everybody’s Fancy]
People are fancy in lots of ways and people are different in lots of ways. Have you ever heard the word “handicapped”? Do you know what it means? Well a handicap is something that makes it very hard for a person to do something. For instance, if you have a handicap in walking that means it’s very hard for you to walk and you might need to wear braces or use a wheel chair to help you get around.
Or if you have a handicap in seeing, that means it’s very hard for you to see and you might need to wear glasses to read. Or even learn to read with your fingers.
It’s hard and I know it’s hard to have a handicap and not be able to do all the things that you want to do. All the things that so many other children can do. But even if there are some things we can’t do, there are lots of things we can do.
See if you can guess what this sound is. [musical triangle sound] It’s a triangle sound. A triangle is a musical instrument. Have you ever heard one?
Now here’s another instrument. Can you guess what it is? [drum sound] That’s a drum sound. If you didn’t have a drum, how would you make such a sound? Did your drum sound like this? Boom! Boom! Boom! Or did it sound like rrrrrrrr? You could make your drum sound loud or you could make it sound soft.
Some people like to play the triangle and some people like to play the drums. Of course there are many different kinds of instruments. One of the ones that I like to play is the piano.
[Plays You Are Special on the piano]
Did that music sound like something you’ve heard before? It was our song called You Are Special.
You know playing the piano is one thing that I really like to do. I’ll play a while and if you feel like it, you clap your hands or make a fist and pound like a drum.
[Plays piano]
It’s fun when children and grown-ups do things together, isn’t it? You have some things you really like to do, don’t you? Well, my doing the things I like and your doing the things you like makes us different from each other. They help people to know us better and better.
[Sings You Are You]
Yes, we’re different people, you and I. But even though we’re different, we do many of the same things. Can you think of some of the same things that everybody does? Well, we all eat don’t we? We all sleep. We all wake up. We all think and love and try to grow. Those are things we all do even though we are very different people.
Do children tease you sometimes? Do you sometimes tease other children? Children do tease each other and call each other names. It’s a way of hurting someone else without really hitting or pinching that person. Does teasing make you feel sad and lonely? It’s fun to laugh with other people, but nobody likes to be laughed at. I think it’s the children who feel uncomfortable inside themselves who laugh at others. I guess it’s because they’re afraid that someone might laugh at them.
Of course, all children have their worries that something might be wrong with them. When I was little I often cried when people laughed at me. But I’ve learned to feel good about who I am and I really understand that children are sometimes afraid of being different.
I’m glad I’m myself and in some ways different from everybody else. And no matter how you are different, I hope you feel good about who you are, too.
[Sings It’s You I Like]
I like our visits together. It gives us a chance to talk and think about important things. You know some things are very hard to understand. When you wonder about things that are hard to understand, you can ask your favorite grown-ups about them. Wondering and talking about things is a very good way to start to understand them. And to grow.
You always make our visits a special time for me. You know how, don’t you? By just your being you. Just your being yourself.
[Sings You Are Special]