Spare the rod and spoil the child.
玉不琢不成器；不打不成器。
2009/06/28
【聯合報╱執筆／台科大應用外語系助理教授黃玟君】

這句諺語直譯是「省著竹竿不用，就會寵壞小孩」，亦即「如果大人很少用棍子打小孩，就會將小孩寵壞」。以往許多父母相信打罵教育可以使孩子「成器」，可是 近年來越來越多人相信「愛的教育」，認為any physical punishment of children is abusive（任何體罰都是虐待孩童），甚至一些中小學的老師也因為體罰學生而受到教育單位的懲戒。前陣子證嚴法師有感於台灣父母過於溺愛孩子，因此呼 籲大家「要愛孩子，但不要寵孩子」，究竟哪一種觀點較有道理，讀者可以自行體會！

實用對話Conversation

 

A:Ms. Lin, have you heard? We are no longer allowed to physically punish students.

B:Are you saying that we can't smack their palms, pinch their ears, or slap them on their faces anymore?

A:Not only that, we are also not allowed to make them stand, do pushups, or do laps on the track!

B:Then I guess we can no longer call them pigs or morons anymore!

A:Of course not!

B:Sigh. Spare the rod and spoil the child. Students will definitely abuse this.

 

 

 

 

字彙Vocabulary

no longer 不再

physically (adv.) 身體上

punish (v.) 懲罰

smack (v.) 打

palm (n.) 手掌心

pinch (v.) 捏

slap (v.) 摑；掌擊

pushup (n.) 伏地挺身

lap (n.)（運動場的）一圈

track (n.) 跑道

moron (n.)（口語）白癡

spare (v.) 省用；吝惜

rod (n.) 竿；棒

spoil (v.) 寵壞；溺愛

abuse (v.) 濫用（自由、權利等）

新聞來源: http://mag.udn.com/mag/campus/storypage.jsp?f_MAIN_ID=381&f_SUB_ID=3742&f_ART_ID=201027