Parents accompany their children to read two most often have two confusions: one is what books to choose to read, and the other is how to read. What book to choose to read is a screening problem for information, and if the child does not like this book, they can change it. Relatively speaking, how to read is more difficult, and it is difficult to find a standard method that can be taught by hand.
Although we all know that choosing books and reading books for children should take into account his comprehension ability and interest preferences, the reading process that occurs in each family is still full of privacy and personalization. In the reading experience of parents verbal communication, it is often a description of their feelings as a reading companion, and it is difficult to reproduce the actual impact of parents on their children in detail because of certain views in the subconscious of the reading scene. For example, when a parent thinks in his heart, "I read this book today to learn some knowledge during the winter vacation", then he may emphasize whether he remembers the knowledge in the conversation with his child, which will cause the child to resent. That is to say, the parents' understanding of reading itself is reflected in the specific operation of "how to read".
Today's article is divided into two parts. The first part comes from the self-prologue of Wang Liang, the author of "Daddy's Literature Lesson", originally titled "Why Should I Write Such a Pamphlet". There are a total of 40 short stories in this book, which are the dialogue between father and daughter when Wang Liang tells his daughter about literature, which directly presents the scene where he reads with his daughter, that is, a private scene that takes place in a family. There are no reference books, no standard answers, no preset goals in advance, only the casualness of talking wherever you think, and the "father's story" that makes children want to discuss, and even Replace Li Bai's "Drinking Alone Under the Moon" (part 1) with a cheerful atmosphere.
"Daddy's Literature Class", written by Wang Liang, lefu culture | Beijing United Publishing Company, January 2022 edition.
The self-prologue expresses Wang Liang's views on parent-child reading, and the main text is the embodiment of this view. In order to more fully present the father's educational philosophy, we have also selected a content from the main text to put in the second part, which is titled "Details Give Life to the Article". Perhaps many people do not think that even if your reading concept is correct, the tone, speed and way of asking questions when reading to children will also affect the effectiveness of communication.
To my daughter about literature,
Her answers and questions often left me in deep thought
When my daughter was 5 years old, I bought her a set of "Picture Books of Masters of World Literature", one of which was Cortázar's "Words of the Bear". I read the story with her, and after reading it, she couldn't wait to run to the bathroom and approach the water pipe to hear if the "pipe bear" was moving. For a long time afterward, every time she washed her hands, she would say "pipe bear" and lick her again. At first, I was afraid to mislead her, before she asked me "Is 'Pipe Bear' real?" Sometimes there was a bit of a mouthful, but soon, her self-questioning and self-answer completely dispelled my concerns, "How can there be a bear, just water!" But that didn't stop her from enjoying the "pipe bear" licking her. So when she asked me this again a few days later, I decisively told her that the "pipe bear" was real, and when it caught a cold, the pipes in our house would get stuck (at the time, my sewers were a bit blocked). Then there was the only one of us who understood, happy laughter.
The Words of the Bear, by Julio Cortázar [Argentina], Illustrated by Emilio Uveruaga [Spain], translated by Fan Ye, 99 Reader | Zhejiang Children's Publishing House, April 2015.
Around this time, I began to consciously engage in co-reading activities with my daughter. At first, like most parents, I read to my child to help her overcome dyslexia so that she could listen to stories fluently and freely. As a "literary middle-aged", in the process of reading, I often "itched" and could not help but carry some private goods, and simple reading gradually became reading while talking. Later, in order to attract my children's attention, I tried to turn the co-reading activity into a "fantasy game", asking my daughter to "reconstruct" the scene when the story took place, imagining what it would be like for me to play a certain role. In this way, the child's sense of participation and recognition is increased, and her understanding of a story or article is enhanced.
As my daughter grows older, in addition to encouraging her to read independently, the focus of co-reading activities gradually changes from reading to post-reading discussion, exchanging her own views and opinions after reading a story and an article together. At this point, I think One of Ms. Montessori's words is very good: "We are the guides of travelers who have just entered the world of human thought." We should be intelligent and cultured guides, without nonsense, clearly and concisely explaining the artistic work that the traveler is interested in, and respecting him and making him enjoy observing. Our initiative lies in guiding him to observe the most important and beautiful things in life, so that he does not spend his time and energy on useless things, so that he can enjoy and satisfy his entire life journey. "To sum up, it is a sentence, with my children to learn life, to understand the world."
In addition to how to read, I also began to think about what to read. In the beginning, it was around the daughter's language textbooks, such as some ancient poems. In addition to what was said in school, I tried to explain it from different angles, inspiring my daughter to experience and feel the aesthetic meaning contained in these ancient poems. The content in the textbook was limited, and I began to gradually expand the scope of my choices: at first, the list of co-reading books in my mind was some tomes, such as "Nils Rides a Goose", "The Wind in the Willows", "The Wizard of Oz" and so on. Since my daughter went to school, I found that her time was quite tight, and after completing the homework assigned by the teacher, resting properly, and playing properly, her energy was no longer enough to support her to read—a few times, I read the story and she fell asleep.
As a result, some relatively short works that can flexibly use fragmented time, such as poetry, small prose, and stories, have become the objects of my focus. In the choice of such materials, I prefer to choose those that are "appropriate" rather than absolutely "good" and "should" materials - on the book lists thrown to parents by our education experts and writers, we can often see exaggerated marketing terms such as "must read for teenagers", "designated by the Ministry of Education", "recommended for new curriculum standards", as if without reading these books, teenagers will not be able to maintain their qualifications and will be exiled to an outer planet. In fact, nothing is "required to read", and forcing children to give some classic masterpieces that children cannot understand and accept is just as barbaric and irresponsible as not giving him any spiritual food. As for what is "appropriate", it is a question that varies from person to person, depending on each child's growing environment, family atmosphere, educational background and, more importantly, talent and understanding. Personally, this answer implies at least two meanings: one that I have read, that I have liked and carefully pondered, and that which is not beyond the scope of my daughter's life experience and understanding.
In order not to give my daughter a raw meal, I was forced to "open source" in addition to continuing to search my stomach: I added a lot of books about education, popular science, children's literature, child psychology and even children's philosophy to my reading list, even comic books that I would not glance at before, and I began to dabble in them occasionally. In addition to reading, I also paid attention to some front-line teachers who were engaged in educational practice activities, reading their lesson plans, listening to their lectures and videos. For a while, whenever they met someone, after three sentences, they would turn to the issue of education, which almost made relatives and friends avoid it.
This has benefited me a lot, broadened my horizons, and allowed me to think about reading and education from the perspective of a simple literature lover: In contemporary times, a rather embarrassing scene is that as parents of children's reading guides, many people basically gave up reading after entering the society, and their reading scope will not exceed professional reference books, WeChat paragraphs and online novels. When images, videos, etc. become the main channels for human beings to obtain knowledge and information, when adults choose more intuitive shortcuts, but let children who are more dependent on sensory experience to take a difficult long road, it is difficult to be convincing.
Painting of Wang Liang's daughter.
The decline of reading activity is in the contemporary era or an irreversible fact, in this rapidly changing world, where reading activity will eventually go, it is difficult to say clearly, and it is not something that an ordinary parent can grasp and control. A more practical approach is to no longer have a superstitious attitude towards reading activities, on the one hand, constantly ritualizing and sanctifying reading activities, blindly believing in words such as "opening the book is beneficial"; on the other hand, honestly drifting away from reading activities at the behavioral level - it is not impossible to choose images and video materials suitable for children to share with them, compared to the original materials, many adapted versions of images and videos are more modern and more suitable for children to read and watch.
If there is an institution or department that can carry out a reading examination activity, such as a reading 10 certification like piano level 10, then I believe that reading education will gain more lasting vitality in China, at least until the relevant documents are obtained. This kind of thinking inertia of parents who have to learn to have results and prove that it is clear that they are anxious at the moment, as if they cannot pass the examination or cannot achieve a certain project, learning has no meaning. And reading, especially the fairy tales and picture books that are told as stories, to be honest, can really provide more than just removing the meaning of hyphenation and the load of these words, such as knowledge or ethical and moral concepts.
Literary reading is essentially useless, it is just an anonymous invitation issued by the author, inviting anonymous readers to see, to hear, to touch, to feel, to imagine, to think with him - this concept may not be approved and understood by anxious Chinese parents, it is indeed contrary to this social atmosphere of pursuing practicality, efficiency, and effectiveness everywhere, but as Russell asked: "If people do not know how to use leisure and health, then what is the point of obtaining them?" And his warning is all the more worthy of introspection from every parent who holds this view: "To stifle childhood fantasies is to make children slaves to the status quo, to beings tied to the earth, so that they cannot be expected to create heaven." ”
After getting rid of the superstitious atmosphere attached to reading and abandoning the utilitarian purpose of reading, what is left of reading activity? In this regard, I like a statement by the English literary critic John Carey that the reason why reading activity can survive in the contemporary world stems from a kind of "imperfect defect" in its relative video and image, that is, the video and the image are almost "perfect", and there is almost no difference between what you see and what you want to express, but reading is not good, it must go through a process of decipherment and decoding. In fact, this process is a process of thinking and aesthetics.
Specific to literary reading education, I think that in addition to helping children complete basic work such as literacy and hyphenation, mastering literary meaning, etc., it is more important to carry out literary enlightenment education - this is not related to examinations, and the backward recitation of classical literary works is not related to the flow, and it has nothing to do with attitude towards the world - in fact, it is very simple, language is alive, the language and literature framed by it are also alive and vital, and children are naturally sensitive to vitality (such as children love small animals), parents, What teachers do should be to trigger and expand these talents they already have, so that the fun and charm of them will naturally appear, so as to enhance their comprehensive analysis ability, overall cognitive ability and aesthetic imagination.
If this is still "dusty", still obsessed with the purpose and function of reading, then Virginia Woolf's question is more apt expression of the voice of an ordinary reader: "Who reads for what purpose, no matter how desirable this purpose is?" Aren't some of our pursuits wonderful and fun in themselves? Isn't reading such a pursuit? ”
In the end, I taught my daughter to study literature, which became a leisure activity that made us both happy and relaxed: when I finished a day's work, returned home exhausted, and read with my daughter, talked about poetry and literature, and talked about the past involved in these poems, it was enough to make me shake off the fatigue and boredom of my body, and feel the beauty and comfort of life again.
In particular, the unique way children know things — the "pipe bear" story mentioned above I have shared with people on different occasions, at a reading party organized by a university alumni, when I finished reading this picture book, the reactions of the adults around me were unexpected — in addition to silence, I was surrounded by solemn, doubtful eyes. To ease the mood, I tried to ask them what exactly was a "pipe bear"? Many people smiled awkwardly until I asked myself and published the answer, and a few people breathed a sigh of relief and said, "I think it's the same, but I just don't think it's going to be that simple."
The repetition of the past is not to show off my daughter's understanding, but rather to remind me how easily an adult is swayed and bound by all kinds of ideas, theories, and countless inexplicable reasons. Unlike adults, who are forward-looking and deliberate, children use a more intuitive way to recognize and grasp the unknown experience and world, and sometimes they are more likely to approach the essence of the problem than we do. Philosopher Gareth A. B. Matthews argues: "Most adults determine what is the real cause according to custom; we adults have only a false advantage in cognition compared to children." ”
In the process of reading and speaking, my daughter's questions or answers often surprised me, and some of them caught me off guard, thus enriching and enhancing my own understanding and understanding. Unconsciously, the positions of teaching and learning are reversed and exchanged, and some words, experiences and past events, in her daughter's place, are reforged by her vigorous vitality to create a brilliant spark, and the one-way "teaching" has become an equal dialogue and exchange.
I don't think there's a better education than treating a child as an equal to us and respecting him. And to do that is no easy feat, and studying literature with my children is part of this education. I never wanted to raise my children to be poets, writers, etc., either because I did not have the ability to do so, and because in the current context of reality, neither of these were wise as professions. But literature is not, it has never been prepared and existed only for those professionals, it has always been directed to a broader mass—we have a common name because of a common hobby, the reader.
Details give life to the article
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On Friday, the daughter was unwell and took her home early. Because of her illness, the homework was naturally postponed, and the "Math Help" that gave her a headache these days was also temporarily cancelled, and replaced by the story reading link she liked. On Friday and two days on the weekend, when there was plenty of time, I found Kipling's Book of the Jungle to read with her.
The Book of the Jungle, by Rudyard Kipling, translated by Duan Ye, guomai culture | Tianjin People's Publishing House, December 2017 edition.
I read Kipling after I went to graduate school, and I felt that I hated each other late. At that time, in addition to classes, I basically read in the Library of YunDa, reading one afternoon at a time. After reading every day, I am not in a hurry to go back to the dormitory, step to the small supermarket in the dormitory area, buy a can of beer, a bag of fish skin peanuts, and take two bites at a flower bed in the park open space. At this time, several stray cats in the park will come and meow with interest. As is customary, I gave them the "skins" of fish skin peanuts to eat—I remember reading Kipling and going back later because I had read his two pamphlets, The Jungle Book and the White Seal, in one sitting. When I got to the flower bed, it was already dark, and I peeled the fish skin peanuts and threw them in front of the cats—for the first time in my life, I noticed the amber, glowing eyes of the felines in the darkness. The light made people shudder, in a trance, as if the panther Bagilla suddenly broke out of the darkness...
When I read these long stories to my daughter, I didn't seek speed or pursue the right words — I think the ones that are sent every day in the circle of friends let the children read aloud like cCTV announcers, except for practicing Mandarin, which does not help to deeply understand the work. Of course, the main reason is that I am not good at reading aloud, and Mandarin is not standard. When I start reading the story, I will slow down and let my daughter gradually step into the world of texts, especially some names, and at the beginning, I will stop and ask her again, who are these names? If she encounters something she doesn't understand, a word she doesn't understand, and asks a question, then the reading can be interrupted at any time, explained, and then continued.
In places where imagination, understanding, or the use of the senses need to be mobilized to experience, I will continue to slow down, give her time to feel, and stop if necessary. For example, when I read the sentence "His voice is smooth, like wild honey dripping from a branch", which describes Bagilla the Appearance of Panther, I would stop and let my daughter imagine for herself what the wild honey dripping from the branch felt like, and what the voice described by that feeling would be. For example, describing the python Kea as "gliding silently on the branches of the tree, as silent as if moss grows", I asked her to imagine how small the sound of moss growth would be, and told her that even if it was so small, it could not be said that there was no sound, that would not be right.
For example, read the close-up of Mowgli when he knocks the fire canister over the grass and raises the fire: "The boy stood naked, and in the light of the fire, his long black hair fluttered on his shoulders, and the flames of the burning branches reflected countless shadows jumping and trembling." I stopped and asked my daughter if she could see it? She replied yes. I asked her, why do you think it's not directly about wolves here, but about their "jumping and trembling" in the shadows of the fire? The daughter thought for a moment and shook her head. I asked her to imagine her playing a game of hand shadow with her mother at night: Was the hand shadow on the white wall clearer and more vivid than we thought, against the backdrop of the darkness all around? Isn't its silhouette simpler and more "sharp" to look at? Is its opening and closing and shaking more obvious than the hand itself? She understood at once and giggled. I explained it to her a little more, and another important reason for writing this here is to set off the burning flame, because because it makes everything have the dynamic of the flame jumping.
In some places, I would speed up and even deliberately not gasp for breath, such as the scene where Bagira, Baru, Koa and Bandaloh were fighting. I wanted my daughter to feel the tight rhythm of the drums of war and the torrential rain, and let her watch the battle with Bat Munger and Wild Elephant Hattie. It turned out to be quite good, she really "entered" the battle, and because of the nervousness, she involuntarily called out to her father.
After reading the first chapter, I asked two questions, one was why Mowgli cried after successfully repelling Hill Khan and the wolves? Reading the part where Mowgli cried with a broken heart, her daughter also had tears in her eyes, and she understood that feeling. Her answer was because he was leaving the house – I felt it was an impeccable answer. I asked her why Tiger Hill Khan wanted to eat Mowgli so much? My daughter said that because he wanted revenge— an answer that made sense, but it wasn't quite the same as I thought, I think it was because he didn't dare to face his own cowardice — but it might be a bit difficult for a child of my daughter's age to understand, so she didn't continue. She told me that the jackal Taibazi was like the fox in the fox fake tiger Wei Li! I think, indeed.
I read the second chapter last night, and before I read it, I asked her to briefly repeat yesterday's story—after she stumbled and tried two or three times, I taught her a simple way to tell a story, which was to start with "Once Upon a Time..." Now, she drew inspiration from the stories she had heard before, and gave me a brief retelling of the first chapter in a "once upon a time" way.
In the second chapter, I also asked two questions, one was what Bagira, Balu, and Koa were doing during the battle, and how did they fight? The daughter was particularly impressed by this festival, probably because of the funny, and she especially liked Baru to sit down and "take the Bandalo into her arms,...... Then it began to beat rhythmically, like a paddle wheel lapping at the water", this section, while saying and imitating, is particularly happy. The second question is why is Blandaro so annoying? The daughter summed it up by saying, "They always yell, throw things on other people's heads, and take Mowgli away, and people don't want to go!" It sounds a lot like a jungle version of their school code of conduct. I added two more points to her, one is that Bamdale is not a bit selfish? They always think of their own convenience, but never consider the feelings of others. Another point is that they not only do not follow the jungle rules, but also wantonly destroy.
That night, when she was bathing and rubbing her back, she dodged and cried out in pain as usual, but today she added an extra line: "Mom, the hair on my back has been half removed." She seemed to be worse than the scarred Bagilla.
Author | Wang Liang
Edit | Shen Chan
Introduction Proofreading | Lucy