Middle School Library - Book Reviews

The Secret School by Avi is a very good book. It starts out with Ida Bidson, who wants to be a teacher when she grows up. Everything was going great at school until Mr. Jordan, who was the head of the school board, needed to tell the students some very important information. The important information of course was, that their teacher’s mother was very sick, and that their teacher, Miss Fletcher, would have to leave the kids to take care of her mother. Mr. Jordan said that the school would be closed until the start of the next school year. The students were devastated by the news. Ida was worried because she and another student, Tom Kohl, were supposed to take the exit exams to move on to high school. Since the school was closing, they could not take the exams. Ida really did not want to go through another year of eighth grade so, Tom gave Ida an idea. The idea was to have Ida be the teacher and keep the school open, but keeping it a secret at the same time. Will Ida make the right choice about keeping the school secret? Do Ida and Tom graduate? Find out the answer by reading The Secret School.

On a scale of one to ten, I would give this book an 8.5. I would give The Secret School this score because it was a good book, though it was a little bit boring. I enjoyed it though, and I would definitely recommend it. The Secret School is an inspirational story and teaches you to stand up for what you believe in even though there might be obstacles standing in your way. I also learned that sometimes in order to help other people you have to put their needs before your needs. On that note, I thought that The Secret School was a good choice to read, because of the age of the characters and the lessons learned that can apply to our lives.

By Maddie Sensibile