歡樂太陽之高中英文講堂

有時候會遇到故事體的課文，沒有太多特殊的單字或文法，故事的鋪陳也普通時，我會讓大家來玩看圖說故事。

首先，約莫一個月前，先找班上一兩位畫插畫的高手，將課文分為五至六個分鏡圖。

然後，我的上法有三種，看當時的進度壓力而定。

(1) 將班上分為4~5人一組，每組編出一個完整的故事，寫在學習單上。老師改完之後，待老師上完課文，每組各派一人上台分享各組的故事。

(2) 全班以接龍方式完成故事。如果全班40人，畫了五張圖，表示每一張圖要有至少八個人就同一張圖接龍，一人一句話，可用抽籤方式增添刺激感，亦可規定最低字數。

(3) 沒時間的時候可以直接搭配課文，用簡報做成繪本的模式，賞心悅目。

以下是多年前遠東版第二冊第五課的課文，及當時學生畫的插圖。

Lesson 5  The Diving Lesson

Without admitting it to myself, I always seemed to live in the shadows of my older brother and sister. After all, they were “A” students and very popular with other students. Whenever I met new people, they’d say, “Oh, you’re Elizabeth and Gerald’s younger sister!” I liked the attention, but it had a bad side, too.

I made average grades, had a few friends instead of hundreds, and was too shy even to join a club. Secretly, I always suspected that people wondered how in the world we could be from the same family. However, something magical happened when I turned twelve.

That June, my parents began taking the family to a local community center. We could swim, play games, and visit with other families. I’m not sure what my brother and sister did during those hot summer days at the center, because for the first time in my life I was too busy doing my own thing. Every day, I watched three or four kids practice their dives. I memorized all the names and studied all their moves. I imagined I was the one leaping high in the air and then cutting into the water without a splash; instead, I did plain dives from the pool’s edge.

Then one day it happened. The diving coach called to me just as I surfaced from a dive. “Why don’t you do that off the board?” he asked. “I could teach you some other techniques.” If Brian hadn’t been so friendly, I might have tried to escape. But instead, I found myself on the board, knees like mashed potatoes, the pool noises just a roar in my head. There was no place to go but in – head first.

“See?” Brian said afterward. “You’re a natural.” That was the right thing to say, then, because I needed praise. But this “natural” never worked so hard in her life. Eventually, I was not just graceful but good enough for the center’s team.

Meanwhile, my parents thought I was “playing at the pool.” My mother still likes to tell the next part of this story. One Saturday, she and Dad and my brother and sister were eating lunch at the center’s picnic area when they heard my name announced over a loudspeaker. Here Mother always says,” We thought you had drowned!” But by the time they ran to the pool, the announcements were about a diving and swimming meet.

However, their shock wasn’t over: There was their younger daughter, standing on the board and waiting to make her first competition dive. And what a dive it was! I didn’t win any medal sin that meet, but I did get my picture in the newspaper (a clean swan dive from the high board) and had the reward of my parents’ proud faces.

Looking back, I realize now that my parents didn’t need any “proof” to think I was worth something. I did. I needed an accomplishment of my own, and diving was it. From then on, I felt like a person, not a shadow.