Aero and Officer Mike: Police Partners
By Joan Plummer Russell
Published By Boyds Mills Press
Review by: Yvonne Gaudet
This amazing book written by Joan Plummer Russell, is about police officers and K-9 units, or in particular Officer mike and his partner, Aero. While reading this story, you will go through a day, from sun up to sun down, with this remarkable police duo. Aero is a working police dog, who wears a police badge on his collar, similar to the badge worn by police officers like officer Mike. This book discusses many topics in which canines are used in the police forces. Some examples are on patrol, in SWAT teams, during illegal drug searches and more. It also defines in detail the amount of training these k-9 officers go through in order to do their jobs to the best of their ability.
Aero and Officer Mike also visit schools and hospitals to teach the children about K-9 patrols and to let the children become familiar with these wonderful working dogs! Officer Mike teaches children how to properly approach a dog. They need to ask the owner for permission to pet an animal before they try to pat it themselves. He then explains how to let the dog sniff your hand, and then pet his ears and head gently.
This book is filled with beautifully photographed pictures, which were taken by Kris Turner Sinnenberg.
This book is a great addition to any library or classroom and would be perfect when teaching about our community helpers. I used this book with my daycare children during out segment on playing safe in our neighborhood this summer as it covers areas on how K-9�s are sometimes used to find lost or missing children. We are also aware of the canine unit in our neighborhood, so this book was an extremely useful tool in making the children see the K-9 officer as a working animal, which is not allowed to play when he should be working.
I would recommend this book for ages 0-10. The younger children will love the pictures and the older children will find the information very educational and useful.
