From the very beginning of school we make books and reading a constant source of possible failure and public humiliation. When children are little we make them read aloud, before the teacher and other children, so that we can be sure they "know" all the words they are reading. This means that when they don't know a word, they are going to make a mistake, right in front of everyone. After having taught fifth-grade classes for four years, I decided to try at all costs to rid them of their fear and dislike of books, and to get them to read oftener and more adventurously.
从一开始，我们就让书籍和阅读成为可能失败和公开羞辱的持续来源。当孩子们还小的时候，我们让他们在老师和其他孩子面前大声朗读，这样我们就可以确保他们“知道”他们正在读的所有单词。这意味着，当他们一个字都不知道的时候，他们就会在所有人面前犯错误。在教了四年五年级的课之后，我决定尽全力让他们摆脱对书籍的恐惧和厌恶，让他们更频繁、更加敢阅读。
One day soon after school had started, I said to them, "Now I'm going to say something about reading that you have probably never heard a teacher say before. I would like you to read a lot of books this year, but I want you to read them only for pleasure. I am not going to ask you questions to find out whether you understand the books or not. If you understand enough of a book to enjoy it and want to go on reading it, that's enough for me. Also I’m not going to ask you what words mean. "
开学后不久的一天，我对他们说，“现在，我要说一些你可能从未听过老师说的关于阅读的话。我希望你今年能读很多书，但我希望你读这些书只是为了好玩。我不会问你问题来确定你是否理解这些书。如果你对一本书有足够的理解来欣赏它，并想继续读下去，那对我来说就足够了。我也不会问你这些词是什么意思。"
The children sat stunned and silent. Was this a teacher talking? One girl, who had just come to us from a school where she had had a very hard time, looked at me steadily for a long time after I had finished. Then, still looking at me, she said slowly and seriously, "Mr Holt, do you really mean that?" I said just as seriously, "I mean every word of it."
孩子们目瞪口呆地坐着，一声不吭。这是老师在说话吗？一个女孩刚从一所学校来到我们这里，她在那里度过了一段非常艰难的时光，在我说完后，她持续地看着我。然后，她还是看着我，缓慢而严肃地说：“霍尔特先生，你真的是这个意思吗？“我也很认真地说：“我是认真的。”
During the spring she really astonished me. One day, she was reading at her desk, From a glimpse of the illustrations I thought I knew what the book was. I said to myself, "It can't be," and went to take a closer look. Sure enough, she was reading Moby Dick , in edition with woodcuts. I said, "Don't you find parts of it rather heavy going?" She answered, "Oh, sure, but I just skip over those parts and go on to the next good part. "
春天的时候，她真的让我大吃一惊。有一天，她在课桌前看书。看了一眼插图，我想我知道这本书是什么。我对自己说，“不可能”，然后仔细看了看。果不其然，她正在读木刻版的《白鲸》。我说：“你不觉得其中一些部分很难看懂吗？”她回答：“哦，当然，但我只是跳过这些部分，继续下一段精彩部分。"
This is exactly what reading should be and in school so seldom is,an exciting, joyous adventure. Find something, dive into it, take the good parts, skip the bad parts, get what you can out of it, go on to something else. How different is our mean-spirited, picky insistence that every child get every last little scrap of "understanding" that can be dug out of a book.
这正是阅读应该有的一次令人兴奋、快乐的冒险，而学校很少这样。找出一些段落，深入其中，抓住好的部分，跳过不好的部分，尽你所能，继续阅读。我们自私、挑剔地坚持让每个孩子都能从书中挖掘出最后一点“理解”，这是多么的不同。
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