Remembering Lenny and Mel

 Amazon doesn't have a picture for After-School Confidential

Trying to understand what my son understands when he

reads can be as frustrating for me as many of my questions

about the story are for him. We read another installment

in Kraft’s superlatively silly enfants terrible 

(be sure to pronounce that in French)

Lenny & Mel saga last week.

I thought we both enjoyed and understood the story.

But perhaps a week is a very long time when you are

going to school and studying for standardized tests.

For today when I asked him about it, he wanted to talk about

“confidential” which he thought meant “hall.”  I defined confidential

as secret, and asked him to write what he remembered of

the story. 

He wrote:

“Lenny and Mel: After-School Confidential

I remember that confidential means “secret.””

I threw a small fit. “Don’t you remember anything about

the story?”

Finally I set a timer for three minutes and told him to write whatever

he wanted, but if he didn’t remember something, he would need to 

look at the book until he did.

He wrote this (unedited by either of us) :

“Lenny and Mel had a poetry contest one day.

There came a cool d,adio who was fond of poetry.

He can say stuff like “Yo man!”, and “Cool man!”

Lenny was trying to dream while Mel was around.

That Lenny and Mel story ended the next day after the dream.”

After-School Confidential describes how Lenny and Mel 

“investigate” after school clubs for the school newspaper.

The short chapters, goofy pictures, and general silliness

make this an ideal choice for struggling readers. But -

if that struggling reader is my son he apparently can/will 

ignore the entire framework of the story to focus on 

the elements that interest him: poetry and dreams.

He thinks I share his dreams. Kids with autism frequently 

think you know what they know (theory of mind). If only

I did .  .  .

-Specrum Mom