2019-06-28

【Aiden in English】

        “How does one think of something to write about?”

        I get that a lot from my students. Usually, a prompt is slapped in their face, a pencil stabbed into their hand, arms taped to the table, and a clock glued to their eyes, telling them, “Hey, this is exactly what you should do to get a good grade.” Oddly, I respect the school system for this matter. They understand that not all kids are creative, and it’s a tough pill I’ve come to swallow.

        In elementary school, ideas burst out of my head faster and more frequently than words describe. I held so many ideas; many times, instead of struggling to think of ideas, I had too many choices.

        In school, the teacher passed down a prompt. The prompts would command, no other word for it, students down a road with an imperative sentence and strict descriptions, eliminating any creative thought. Again, some students are less open to the inception of ideas, but this process is just… the absolute worst. 

        Outside the devil’s child known as essay prompts, the writing process is… far less strict. Having young students brainstorm and then proceed with an outline is not an evil plan. Unlike myself, reckless, it appeared to work well, in addition to preparing students for future assignments in higher education. 

        Here’s a personal anecdote that I would like to share. In the fourth grade—no… fifth grade, no… it’s all the same to me now. Regardless, I recall attempting a new skill I saw in a book: the hyphen. A simple dash connects two words that link together to form something more descriptive or meaningful. I saw it once in a book and wanted to integrate the skill into my arsenal. 

        I ended up receiving a “Proficient” in conventions. In other words, it is sub-optimal to my usual performance (Advanced is the highest tier, and elementary schools were always hesitant to hand out letter grades). The hyphen was misused, which was unsurprising even at the time. But the reaction from the teacher, as I recall, was a red circle drawn around the hyphen and a question mark scribbled below. Of course, the first thing any student needs to do is appeal to the teacher. I asked if I could receive less punishment because of an error in the trial. After all, I was learning. However, stuck within the confines of rigorous teaching, nothing changed.

        As a result, I became scared of innovating. Many more examples of trial and error in my writing would appear later, yet I blamed myself for putting something new into my writing with every mistake. I never stood up to the system and shouted, “You’re wrong,” because I knew the system would spit right back deep down. Is this wrong? Is it wrong to hiss at embarrassing errors made in the name of learning? As children, we are educated to understand mistakes as a process everyone goes through. That entirely contrasts with my school experience.

        Another result of that young incident is a new inability to use hyphens. I understand they are powerful grammatical tools, but I have developed some mental gag reflexes from a sour past.

【紅霞譯】

        “人怎樣把想的東西寫出來?”

        我從所教的學生那裡體會頗多。通常情況下，作文提示語啪唧甩到跟前，大家只得攥緊鉛筆頭，胳膊趴在桌子上，兩眼盯住時鐘，告誡自己“嘿，這跟得分有關”。出乎意料地，我同意學校這種做法，畢竟老師們清楚並非每個孩子都別具想象力，這讓我情何以堪。

        我記得上小學的時候，腦袋瓜里奇思異想總是層出不窮，簡直無法用語言來描述，況且很多念頭用不着使勁去想，要什麼有什麼。

        在學校，老師給出提示語。提示語如同聖旨，沒有其它代名詞，學生必須服從權威性指令，嚴禁自由發揮。總有個別學生我行我素，但結果肯定……沒有好果子吃。

        且不談魔鬼再生俠即作文提示語，寫作過程……遠非那麼嚴格，讓滿頭霧水的年輕人按照條條槓槓寫作未嘗不可。別像我漫無邊際，沒有規矩不成方圓，這樣可以幫助學生為將來深造做準備。

        在此我想分享一下個人趣聞。四年級，不對……五年級，不對……現在對我來說完全一碼事，總而言之，我記得當時曾想嘗試剛從書本上學來的新招：連字符。小破折號將兩個單詞連接在一起，形成更具表現力的詞彙，我是從書上看來的，並想活學活用。

        我在考試中因此得了“良好”，換句話說，僅次於本人正常分數線（優秀是評分系統中最高檔，小學對該用什麼字母表示考試結果總是遲疑不決），連字符用得不當。即便在那個年頭，我一點也不感覺奇怪，但我認為老師卻反應強烈，圍着連字符畫了一個紅圈，並在下面打了個問號。當然，任何學生的當務之急就是要向老師申訴緣由，我問是否可以因為初試失誤而少扣點分，畢竟自己正在學習新理念。然而，在一個非常嚴格的教學體制下，分數是不能改的。

        結果，我變得害怕創新，之後的寫作還有很多張冠李戴的例子，乃至各個錯誤，我自責把新東西引入寫作之中，從不敢站出來大聲疾呼“你錯了”，因為我深知教育體制肯定會反戈一擊。錯了嗎？對學習過程中所犯的尷尬錯誤發出噓聲錯了嗎?作為孩子，我們所接受的教育是，每個人都從錯誤中學習，從失敗中成長，這與我在學校的經歷真是大相徑庭。

        年幼時親身經歷的另一後果便是不再使用連字符，我知道連字符是一種行之有效的語法工具，但心酸的往事好像已在我心理上引起某種條件反射。

Today in History(歷史上的今天):

2016: Warnemünde—Mouth of Warrnow, DEU(德國瓦爾內明德—瓦爾諾河口)

2016: Berlin the Capital of Prussia, Germany(德國柏林—普魯士首府)

2016: Berlin Wall, Germany(德國柏林牆)

2015: Dardanelles Strait, Turkey(土耳其歐亞分界線達達尼爾海峽)

2012: Third Grade Drama Camp(三年級戲劇夏令營)

Peace Valley Park (和平谷公園 06-16-2019)

Lake Galena of Peace Valley Park (和平谷公園·方鉛礦湖 06-16-2019)

Crosslink(相關博文):

10th Grade(高中二年級)