2024年4月23日发(作者：)

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全新版大学英语第二册课文

Unit 1Text A Learning, Chinese-Style

Text 课文

Part I Pre-reading Task

Listen to the recording two or three times and then think over the following questions:

1. Who should teach whom? Is learning a one-way street?

2. Should we share our dreams for a better life with our parents or keep them to ourselves?

3. Can children ever understand their parents completely?

4. From the song can you guess what the theme of the unit, way of learning, chiefly refers to?

Part II Text A

Howard Gardner, a professor of education at Harvard University, reflects on a visit to China and

gives his thoughts on different approaches to learning in China and the West.

LEARNING, CHINESE-STYLE

Howard Gardner

For a month in the spring of 1987, my wife Ellen and I lived in the bustling eastern Chinese

city of Nanjing with our 18-month-old son Benjamin while studying arts education in Chinese

kindergartens and elementary schools. But one of the most telling lessons Ellen and I got in the

difference between Chinese and American ideas of education came not in the classroom but in the

lobby of the Jinling Hotel where we stayed in Nanjing.

The key to our room was attached to a large plastic block with the room number on it. When

leaving the hotel, a guest was encouraged to turn in the key, either by handing it to an attendant or

by dropping it through a slot into a box. Because the key slot was narrow, the key had to be

positioned carefully to fit into it.

Benjamin loved to carry the key around, shaking it vigorously. He also liked to try to place it

into the slot. Because of his tender age and incomplete understanding of the need to position the

key just so, he would usually fail. Benjamin was not bothered in the least. He probably got as

much pleasure out of the sounds the key made as he did those few times when the key actually

found its way into the slot.

Now both Ellen and I were perfectly happy to allow Benjamin to bang the key near the key

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slot. His exploratory behavior seemed harmless enough. But I soon observed an interesting

phenomenon. Any Chinese staff member nearby would come over to watch Benjamin and, noting

his lack of initial success, attempt to assist. He or she would hold onto Benjamin's hand and,

gently but firmly, guide it directly toward the slot, reposition it as necessary, and help him to insert

it. The "teacher" would then smile somewhat expectantly at Ellen or me, as if awaiting a thank you

— and on occasion would frown slightly, as if considering us to be neglecting our parental duties.

I soon realized that this incident was directly relevant to our assigned tasks in China: to

investigate the ways of early childhood education (especially in the arts), and to throw light on

Chinese attitudes toward creativity. And so before long I began to introduce the key-slot anecdote

into my discussions with Chinese educators.

TWO DIFFERENT WAYS TO LEARN

With a few exceptions my Chinese colleagues displayed the same attitude as the staff at the

Jinling Hotel. Since adults know how to place the key in the key slot, which is the ultimate

purpose of approaching the slot, and since the child is neither old enough nor clever enough to

realize the desired action on his own, what possible gain is achieved by having him struggle? He

may well get frustrated and angry — certainly not a desirable outcome. Why not show him what

to do? He will be happy, he will learn how to accomplish the task sooner, and then he can proceed

to more complex activities, like opening the door or asking for the key— both of which

accomplishments can (and should) in due course be modeled for him as well.

We listened to such explanations sympathetically and explained that, first of all, we did not

much care whether Benjamin succeeded in inserting the key into the slot. He was having a good

time and was exploring, two activities that did matter to us. But the critical point was that, in the

process, we were trying to teach Benjamin that one can solve a problem effectively by oneself.

Such self-reliance is a principal value of child rearing in middle-class America. So long as the

child is shown exactly how to do something — whether it be placing a key in a key slot, drawing a

hen or making up for a misdeed — he is less likely to figure out himself how to accomplish such a

task. And, more generally, he is less likely to view life — as Americans do — as a series of

situations in which one has to learn to think for oneself, to solve problems on one's own and even

to discover new problems for which creative solutions are wanted.

TEACHING BY HOLDING HIS HAND

In retrospect, it became clear to me that this incident was indeed key — and key in more than

one sense. It pointed to important differences in the educational and artistic practices in our two

countries.

When our well-intentioned Chinese observers came to Benjamin's rescue, they did not simply

push his hand down clumsily or uncertainly, as I might have done. Instead, they guided him with

extreme facility and gentleness in precisely the desired direction. I came to realize that these

Chinese were not just molding and shaping Benjamin's performance in any old manner: In the best

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