家長該如何引導孩子學習？一個案例

最近看的一本書the importance of being little裡面講了一個挺生動的案例，我摘選如下，算是個優秀的美式教育的一個典範（注意「優秀」兩個字，並不是所有美式教育都是優秀的），希望那些希望幫助孩子成長、引導孩子學習的成年人，看完有所啟發（盡量看原文，翻譯是我瞎翻的）。

作者之前的文章也介紹過，Erika Christakis，畢業於哈佛大學，後來在耶魯大學兒童研究中心一直從事兒童教育方面的工作，是兒童與教育發展方面的專家。

It』s a wintry morning at the Calvin Hill Daycare in New Haven, Connecticut, and the kindergartners are about to start their morning meeting. The children know the routine and gather with minimal fuss, forming a tight cluster on the floor and on two small benches. Winnie Naclerio, the lead teacher, starts the meeting with a question:

一個冬天的早晨，Calvin Hill幼兒園（你可以理解成耶魯大學幼兒園）準備開始上課，Winnie Naclerio老師提出了一個問題：

DO FISH HAVE BONES?

魚有骨頭嗎？

（有孩子的可以嘗試問問你們家孩子）

「Some of us have noticed our fish moves back and forth in its tank, and we』re wondering if it has bones inside its body,」 she explains. Hands shoot up with a vocal mix of yeses and nos as her simple prompt unleashes a flood of hypotheses.

「魚在魚缸里游來游去，你們有沒有想過，它們有骨頭嗎？」老師繼續說。這個問題很有啟發性，有說有的，也有說沒有的，大家開始紛紛舉手發言。（提出一個好問題永遠好於給出一個好答案。）

「Yeah! Yeah!」 Ben volunteers, 「A long time ago it just happened, I mean, I don』t know where it happened or in which country but, uh, like, seventy people went into the water and maybe eighty or ninety piranhas came up and bit them on their legs! With their teeth!」

Ben說「有的有的，我忘了在哪兒發生過這樣的事情，也不記得是哪個國家，反正就有70來個人下了水，然後就有80或者90條piranhas出現了，咬他們的腿，它們有牙齒」（幼兒園就認識piranha食人魚這種單詞）

「Wow, yes,」 Winnie responds. 「That』s interesting because teeth are a kind of bone, aren』t they? But we wouldn』t have a piranha fish in our fish tank,」 she reassures the nodding faces.

「有意思，牙齒是骨頭的一部分，對不對？」Winnie老師接著說，「但是我們的魚缸里可沒有食人魚」（「牙齒是骨頭的一部分」這樣的信息就教完了）

「Eels don』t really have bones,」 Ava comments.

「鰻魚應該沒有骨頭」Ava說。

「Oh?」 Winnie asks. 「I wonder if we all think that』s true? Why do you think eels don』t have bones?」

「哦？是嗎？我們看看是不是大家都同意你的說法，你為啥覺得鰻魚沒有骨頭呢？」

「Because for them it』s easier for them to slither, like snakes,」 Lucas observes.

「因為沒骨頭才能滑行啊，跟蛇一樣」Lucas觀察道。

「Oh? Hmm. Do snakes have bones?」 Winnie continues.

「哦？嗯。。。。那蛇有骨頭嗎」老師接著問。（明顯超綱，教學大綱肯定只問了魚，沒問蛇，而好的老師知道何時、該如何超綱）

「NO!」 Ryan pipes up.

「No way,」 shouts Margot.

A collective murmur of arguing begins to spread through the group.

「沒有吧，不可能有吧」很多人開始議論蛇有沒有骨頭。（依然用問題引導思考）

「I』m just asking,」 Winnie explains. 「I didn』t say I know the answer. We may need to get out our books and do some research to figure this out. Do snakes have bones?」

「我就問問，我也不知道答案，那我們就查查書吧，研究研究，看看蛇有沒有骨頭」（研究能力是個極其極其極其重要的能力，要儘早培養，可惜的是，很多人面對不懂的事情，只會說：我不會，沒學過，不是這個專業，超出我的專業範圍了。）

「No. No,」 several children murmur.

還是不少孩子說沒有。

「Yes, but really long bones!」 Gavin interjects.

「蛇有骨頭的，但是是那種很長的骨頭」Gavin突然說。

「Like anacondas.」

「就像anacondas那樣」（幼兒園認識anaconda這種單詞）

「Well then, how do they slither around?」 a girl asks, a little plaintively.

「那樣的話，它們是怎麼滑來滑去的？」一小姑娘問道。

「Okay,」 Winnie summarizes, 「so we』re saying that some people think that snakes do have bones and some people say they don』t have bones. Angie』s asking if they do, how can they slither, you know, how can they move their body from side to side like this」—she mimics a slithering snake with her hand—「if they have a hard bone that doesn』t move inside their body?」

老師總結道「好了，有人說有，有人說沒有，Angie問，如果有骨頭，骨頭那麼硬，那蛇怎麼能走S型？」（利用孩子自己的問題來引導思考）

Winnie notices that Sophie has been quiet and asks her to join in.

「Um, at my house I have this goldfish, and I can see its fins and they get kind of black.」

老師注意到Sophie沒參與對話，就問她意見（保持所有人的注意力）

「嗯。。。我家有條金魚，我能看透它的鰭，裡面是黑色的」

「Can you see any bones in your goldfish, I wonder?」 Winnie probes.

「也就是說，你能看見你家金魚的骨頭咯？」老師繼續問。

「Uh-huh,」 Sophie nods, 「I can see them through the clearish body a little.」

「對的，」Sophie點頭說「有些比較透明的地方，我是可以看到的」

「You can? That』s interesting. So how do you think the fish might move with bones in it?」

「你能看到？有意思，那你覺得如果金魚體內有骨頭，它是怎麼移動的呢？」（之前的問題是蛇如果有骨頭是如何移動的，而Sophie的注意力還在魚上，答非所問，老師乾脆順水推舟，但又把問題引導回來）

「Um . . . I think it just moves its tail fins and then it can really move fast.」

「嗯。。。我覺得它動的是尾巴，而且很快」

「Okay, Sophie was saying that she has a fish and she can see its bones and also that it moves with its tail fin. Is there anything on a snake that would help it move if it had bones? I think we』re going to have to do some research on this because I don』t know. . . . Hang on, I』ll come back to you,」 she assures a child. 「Alma, what do you think?」

「好了，Sophie說她能看透她家的金魚，能看見骨頭，而且它是用尾巴來移動的，那蛇是不是也是這樣呢，如果它也有骨頭的話？我覺得咱們得認真研究研究這個問題了，因為我也不知道，Alma，你怎麼想？」

「They just have bones that, um, look like fish, but I』ve been wondering how people eat fish if they don』t take the bones out of it already and also the dinosaurs do not have hands.」

「它們應該跟魚一樣有骨頭的，但是我很好奇，如果不把骨頭剔除，人們怎麼吃魚呢？還有，恐龍也沒有手啊。」

「You』re right the dinosaurs did not have hands. But I wonder if they had bones in another part of their body. Did the dinosaurs have bones?」

「你說的沒錯，恐龍沒手，但是我覺得它們身體其他部分應該有骨頭？恐龍有骨頭嗎？」

「Like fossils in the ground from a long, long, long time ago, and it』s hard like a rock that you have to dig up,」 Matthew explains.

「你看它們的化石就知道了，它們的骨頭跟石頭一樣硬」Matthew說

「Okay, so we』re remembering that dinosaurs have these big, hard bones that can become fossilized, like stone. Fossils.」

「好吧，所以我們知道恐龍是有骨頭的」

「Jayden』s looking at the book,」 someone tattles.

「Jayden沒聽講，他在看別的書」有人說

「I know, I saw that,」 Winnie nods.

A few children begin to complain that Jayden isn』t following the class rules.

「我知道，我看見了」

有人開始抱怨Jayden怎麼不參與討論，不遵守課堂紀律。

「Yes, I saw Jayden pick up the book. And it looks like some of our friends are wondering why I didn』t tell him to put the book away, since we don』t allow that in meeting. But I could see that he picked up the animal encyclopedia book and he』s looking for the picture of the snake, so I thought that would be a good idea.」

「我知道課堂討論的時候是不允許翻書的，我也知道Jayden不遵守課堂紀律，在看書，但是我發現他翻的是動物百科全書，而且他正在查蛇的資料，所以我認為這沒什麼問題」（有人違反課堂紀律，老師不這麼看，並且耐心的解釋給其他孩子聽，Jayden可能是在做研究，不但不應該阻止，反而應該鼓勵）

Another child complains that Jayden was flipping through multiple pages, and not just looking at the one snake page.

有個孩子繼續抱怨，Jayden翻了好多頁，他是亂翻的好不好？才不是只看蛇呢。

「Yes, I saw that, too,」 Winnie patiently observes. 「But you know, it』s hard sometimes to find the page you are looking for, so I was noticing that Jayden was trying to find the page in the book with the snakes. It seems like he is doing some research to help us. Is that right, Jayden?」

「我也注意到了」Winnie老師耐心的說，「有時候，你很難一次性就翻到你想看的那一頁，所以我覺得Jayden是在努力找蛇的那一頁，我覺得他的研究可能對我們有所幫助，對不對，Jayden？」

Jayden nods.

Jayden點點頭

「Okay, so I think we can all stop worrying about the book. Now . . . Mason, you looked like you knew the answer. Tell us your thoughts. We』re still talking about snakes and bones.」

「好了，我們還是回到剛才的問題吧，Mason，你好像有答案了，說說唄，還是蛇和骨頭的問題」

「Well, snakes have little square bones,」 Mason explains, as he forms a circle with his hands.

「It』s like one bone, one bone, one bone, one bone, one bone.」 He gestures with karate chops, suggesting a series of bones attached to a spine. 「And they can move because that』s how the bones are so small and it just moves like that.」

Hands shoot up again.

「蛇有很小的骨頭，」Mason一邊說一邊比劃，「就這樣一個一個接著一個，它能移動就因為它的骨頭比較小」Mason提到一系列的小骨頭連在脊椎骨上的。

「Okay, so we』re wondering if it』s 『one bone, one bone, one bone, one bone,』 like Mason says」—Winnie mimics his karate gestures—「all the way down the snake』s body in a line, and that』s what helps them move and slither?」

「好了，是不是這樣的：骨頭一節一節一節又一節的串成一條線，就像Mason說的，這樣蛇就能走S型了？」

「Yes!」 several children declare in unison.

「是的！」幾乎所有人都同意了。

「Well, I think we are going to have to find out a lot more.」

「好吧，我們還要繼續研究」

There are many striking aspects of this conversation: the children』s verbal sophistication and observational powers; the important role of the children』s own prior experiences; the highly social nature of learning; and of course the passionate struggle to reconcile what the children already know about bones—that giant dinosaurs have them and that they are hard as rock—with the perplexing ability of bony fish and snakes to move fluidly.

敲黑板抓重點了：以上對話不少亮點：

1、 孩子使用複雜辭彙的能力以及觀察能力；

2、 孩子自己有過的經驗無比重要；

3、 高度社交化的學習方式；

4、 把不同孩子對骨頭的不同認知協調一致，比如說大家都知道恐龍有骨頭，而且堅如磐石，但魚和蛇的骨頭和它們移動的方式又有矛盾。

Another surprise is that not once in this dialogue does Winnie ever actually 「teach」 the children anything specific about snakes and fish bones. (As I was observing the conversation, I had to fight the temptation to yell out 「Cartilage!」) She also goes well beyond the kind of bromides we』d find on a classroom poster (「Take care of ourselves and others!」) and coaches the children to think as an organic whole, which we see when she diverts the children from hectoring a child who has violated the class norms. Winnie respects the children』s indignation by carefully explaining her decision to allow Jayden to continue looking at his book, but, unlike other teachers in so many bleak Circle Time meetings, where rules and regulations seem to drive curriculum, Winnie is flexible enough to recognize why his infraction is a sign of research, not disobedience.

另外一個亮點是老師，Winnie從頭到尾都沒有「教」關於魚或者蛇的任何東西（我在旁邊觀察都好幾次忍不住要教「Cartilage」這個概念），也沒有很刻板的教授那些黑板報上寫的東西（比如「照顧好自己，照顧他人」），而是把這些概念有機的結合在一起，引導孩子們不斷的思考，比如有些孩子注意到別的孩子違反了課堂規則，Winnie很好的把大家的注意力又引了回來，Winnie尊重孩子們的不滿情緒，同時也非常小心的向他們解釋Jayden可以繼續看書的決定，但是，不像其他老師那樣刻板，認為規定和規則是教學的驅動力，Winnie對教學非常靈活，她認為Jayden自己查書是一種研究能力的體現，而不是違規。

The ability to see oneself as a researcher is what we call a transferable skill; it can serve as a template for learning in all settings and about any topic. Transferable skills are the most efficient ones to teach children because they can be applied to novel situations requiring new solutions. Being a researcher is the kind of skill we want children to hone early in life so they aren』t dependent on others to spoon-feed them. A researcher』s mind-set is key to most scientific and artistic endeavors, and in fact, there』s increasing evidence that preschoolers who don』t learn to think like researchers show fewer problem-solving skills and less curiosity than children who learn in a more investigative, collaborative fashion.

研究能力是一種「可轉移技能（transferable skill）」，它是學習一切技能的根本，教育孩子最有效的方式就是傳授他們這種技能，這樣才能使他們在任何新環境下都能快速找到解決方案，培養孩子的研究能力越早越好，這樣才能讓他們不依賴別人「飯來張口」，無論是科學還是藝術領域，具備研究能力都是成功的關鍵，已經有很多證據證明，小時候不知道怎麼做研究的孩子，長大後解決問題的能力、好奇心都要弱很多，而那些從小就知道如何調查問題、如何與他人協作的孩子，表現則正好相反。

Researchers rarely work in isolation these days, of course, and in Winnie』s class, each child is elevating the discourse to a new level, even when (as with Sophie』s description of her goldfish』s fins that get black or the initial talk about piranhas) their comments appear tangential. Where other teachers might have tried to stem the river of thoughts, some deeply inchoate, bubbling up from the children,Winnie works instead to keep it flowing, knowing as she does that each child』s perspective waters the ground of another』s mind.

現在搞研究很少是孤軍奮戰了，在Winnie的課堂上這一點特別鮮明，每個孩子都把問題推到了新高度，即使他們的答案可能跟問題關係不大（比如Sophie在描述她家金魚魚鰭的時候，或者一開始說到食人魚的時候），其他老師可能就直接阻止了對話，相當於斬斷了思路的流動，而Winnie沒有，她繼續保持思路流動，她明白這個孩子的思路可能會啟發另外一個孩子。

Mason is probably the only child who has actually seen a snake』s skeleton; he, alone, is struggling to explain how the small bones can move flexibly while fixed to a backbone. But even Mason needs Winnie』s supportive guidance, which we see as she repeats and demonstrates his 「one bone, one bone, one bone」 idea to make it clearer to the others.

Mason可能是為一個親眼見過蛇骨頭的孩子，但是他也無法解釋那些小骨頭是如何與主幹骨連接並且保持靈活的，所以Mason明顯需要Winnie的幫助，Winnie也恰到好處的給予了支持，比如她重複Mason的說法，並且展示「一個一個接一個」的想法，讓更多的孩子明白。

Winnie understands that early learning is fundamentally social in nature and that, in kindergarten, there is no zero-sum trade-off between group and individual goals.Later, she told me, the children did a full investigation about animal bones. Winnie has a good relationship with Yale』s Peabody Museum curators and was able to borrow a codfish spine and a complete fish skeleton for the children to explore.But fish anatomy was not her goal, critical thinking was.

Wonnie老師明白對於早教來說，最根本的其實是社交，而不是個人與集體之間的零和遊戲，她後來跟我說，孩子們一起對動物骨頭做了深入的研究，她跟耶魯Peabody博物館的館長關係很好，所以還特地借了一座鱈魚的骨架到課堂上，供孩子們觀察學習，但是，關於魚的結構不是她的目標，批判性思考才是。

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