纸质书地位岌岌可危英国教育大臣担心英国孩子阅读不足

2014-05-08 14:48:39来源：可可英语

　　Pavan’s favourite activity is playing football outdoors. His second favourite is playing football indoors, and in third place is practising football skills against the sofa. Reading – the pursuit that Francis Bacon claimed “maketh a full man” – comes further down the eight-year-old’s list, behind school, going to discos, buying stuff, chatting to people, watching TV and playing on his Xbox games console.

　　8岁小男孩潘万(Pavan)最喜欢的活动是在户外踢足球，其次是在屋里踢足球，位居第三的，是在沙发上操练球技。培根(Francis Bacon)所谓“读书使人充实”的阅读，在潘万的活动计划名单中非常靠后，远在上学、跳迪斯科、购物、聊天、看电视以及玩Xbox游戏机之后。

　　Would he ever pick up a book for pleasure? “No,” Pavan shoots back jovially. “If I’m bored, I will ask my mum if I can play on her phone.” By this point, I am relieved that Michael Gove is not part of our conversation at a homework club in Harlesden Library, north London.

　　他会出于喜欢而读书吗?“不会，”潘万兴奋地摇摇头说。“自己若是心烦了，就会纠缠妈妈玩她的手机。”说到这里，我感觉如释重负，因为英国教育大臣迈克尔•戈夫(Michael Gove)不会成为我们在伦敦北部哈里斯登图书馆(Harlesden Library)举办的家庭作业俱乐部的谈话内容了。

　　The UK education secretary has long feared that British children are “just not reading enough”. The same concern has been raised by publishers and literacy charities, which worry that new distractions – computer games, online videos, social networking – are pushing books off the shelf. More than 60 per cent of 18-to-30-year-olds now prefer watching television or DVDs to reading, according to a survey for the charity Booktrust. A similar proportion of young people think the internet and computers will replace books in the next 20 years.

　　英国教育大臣一直担心本国孩子“阅读不足”。出版商以及扫盲慈善机构同样也有此隐忧，它们担心电脑游戏、网络视频以及网络社交等新的干扰物正一步步“鸠占鹊巢”。据慈善团体Booktrus调查研究，如今超过60%的18-30岁年轻人把看电视及DVD置于阅读之前。类似比例的年轻人认为因特网与电脑会在20年后取代纸质书籍。

　　The literacy debate received fresh impetus last October when a study from the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development suggested that vast numbers of young people were leaving school without the ability to read well. Of the 24 industrialised countries covered by the research, England was the only one that went backwards, with literacy and numeracy skills lower among the young – those aged 16 to 24 – than the old. (The results were little better in Northern Ireland; Scotland and Wales were not included in the study.)

　　去年10月，经合组织(Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development) 发布的研究报告表明大量年轻人毕业后的阅读能力差强人意，读写能力的争论获得了强有力的新依据。该研究报告涵盖了24个工业化国家，其中英国是唯一排名下滑的国家，其16-24岁年轻人的读写与计算能力逊于成年人。(北爱尔兰的研究结果也大同小异，研究报告并未涉及苏格兰与威尔士两个地区)。

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