School Secretaries

October 1, 2003
Reviewed with Mary Firestone's "Park Rangers."

K-Gr. 3. Expanding the definition of "community helpers "beyond the usual suspects (doctors, police officers, firefighters), these books in the Community Helpers series focus on park rangers and school secretaries. A few lines of text in large type appear on each right-hand page facing a full-page, color photo showing the helper at work. Although the vocabulary includes many long words, the sentences tend to be short and their structure, monotonously similar. "Park Rangers "takes a look at the wide variety of the rangers' responsibilities and activities. "School Secretaries "discusses their training, skills, tools, and job responsibilities. The illustrations in "Rangers" are more varied and natural than those in" Secretaries," which feature posed subjects who gamely smile even while engaged in mundane tasks such as sorting mail and opening doors. Each book ends with brief lists of defined words, books, and Internet sites and a hands-on activity. Utilitarian. (Reprinted with permission of Booklist, copyright 2003, American Library Association.)