Claudia's problems in school

[jen]

Well, she always said the only thing she was good at was art. In Claudia Kishi, Middle School Drop-out, in the first tutoring session with Rosa, she was having problems with EVERYTHING!

[supernatural babe]

The ghost writers were having a laugh. I was reading the earlier books and her spelling was OK. And now it's like Ann is purposely trying to spell words wrong. I remember in Kristy and the ghost? train, there's a bit in her entry that goes something like : lets party, party, praty.

[ktag]

I actually think the school goes really easy on her. In book 2, she says she hadn't really been doing her homework since school started. It's October! How did she get away with not doing homework for two months?! I guess at the beginning of the series, she was just supposed to be "smart" but lazy. Then as the series progressed, she just got dumber and hopeless.

[Deleted]

The one thing about Claudia that drove me NUTS was the 'who'- How are you and who are mom and dad? What the heck was that all about? How could you write 'how', then mispell it as 'who' four words later? It really frustrated me, seeing it in every letter she wrote. The only people I've seen making those kind of mistakes have been dyslexic, and if Claudia supposedly isn't, it just looks so d**n LAZY. I have no sympathy for her if she's apparently so bloody 'smart'.

[macca]

I don't buy that she's smart-but-lazy, except maybe in the earlier books (ktag gave a good example).

Plenty of books have her obsessively stressing out over school issues and studying her ass off. I remember Claudia's Portrait, where she made some mention of "no matter how hard I tried..."

Claudia's poor spelling sometimes looks like handwritten typos.

[jen]

In Claudia's Portrait, when she's sent off to that Academy school thingy, she actually does do well, though. But then in Middle School Dropout, when she's trying really hard, she still isn't doing well.

I think we have to just admit that Claud's intellectual abilities are one huge inconsistency.

[hitzpink]

nic, I totally agree with you! The how/who thing bugs me SO MUCH. It's just...not even possible for a normal, non-dyslexic person to accidentally spell how as "who." As a typo? Yes, that makes sense. In fact, so many of Claudia's "spelling mistakes" make sense as typos (the party party praty thing that was mentioned), and all of them bother me so much. Grr.

I never bought her smart but lazy thing for a second. It doesn't require any effort to spell simple words correctly. I could see if it was a long, difficult word and she was too lazy to go look it up, but there was absolutely nothing in her notebook entries that suggested she was secretly super-smart.

[lilafowler]

there was absolutely nothing in her notebook entries that suggested she was secretly super-smart

Word. If you pretend her entries are spelled correctly, the sentences still sound really simple, none of the "I-read-it-in-a-book"isms the rest of the BSC would use ("Jamie Newton was behaving like an angel, when trouble reared its ugly head") in their notebook entries.

[jen]

lilafowler said:

Word. If you pretend her entries are spelled correctly, the sentences still sound really simple, none of the "I-read-it-in-a-book"isms the rest of the BSC would use ("Jamie Newton was behaving like an angel, when trouble reared its ugly head") in their notebook entries.

Total agreement there!!!

[ktag]

Strange thing is, she claims to like reading, but school/teachers "take the fun out of that" too. Well suck it up. Most required reading is assigned because they're actually pretty d**n good. It's not like they're asking her to read Plato. She's just refusing to really try.

(I know it's useless, but I just can't seem to let this topic go. It'll always bother me.)

[macca]

I never bought her smart but lazy thing for a second. It doesn't require any effort to spell simple words correctly.

ITA! My spelling has always been fine and I was lazy in high school. Spelling is something people either seem to "get" or they don't... nothing to do with effort or lack thereof.

Strange thing is, she claims to like reading, but school/teachers "take the fun out of that" too. Well suck it up

Unfortunately this is an issue where I just want to smack the Kishi parents. You've got a daughter who's borderline retarded and you're going to be selective about what she chooses to read?

[jen]

Yeah, I never quite understood that. I thought, especially with Mrs Kishi being the head librarian, that they'd encourage all sorts of reading! It's almost like censorship, really... And she even speaks up against censorship in Kristy Power!

[ktag]

I still think they knew about it. This is Claudia we're talking about, not Nancy Drew. Okay, the hollow book is pretty cool, but still. I'd be surprised if they didn't know about the hundreds of books and candy Claud's got stashed in her room. Mimi and Janine knew very early on. Forbidding it makes her want it more.

Anyway, what I meant about the reading thing was that Claudia doesn't even give it a chance. She automatically equates anything related to school as boring and impossible. She's not a genius like Janine, so why bother?

[sotypical42483]

Janine knew about all the crap Claudia was hiding?

[sugarmonkey]

Yeah, Janine hid candy to. I can't remember which book it was in, one of the earliest ones.