Helen Keller wrote in her autobiography: "Although I had only 19 months of light, the vast turquoise fields, bright blue skies, verdant grass and bright flowers that I saw were all unmasked by the darkness that followed. ”
Chasing the light and discovering the beautiful is the instinct of human beings, especially children, everything in their eyes is simple and beautiful, and we should take care of this beauty with our hearts.
American writer Harper Lee's novel "To Kill a Mockingbird" is such a book full of temperature. The book, which won the Pulitzer Prize in 1961 and has been translated into more than 40 languages, is the "parenting bible" that has affected 50 million families worldwide.
In the novel "To Kill a Mockingbird", the lawyer father Addiks teaches children to maintain their own judgment of the world, and he passes on the faith of integrity and kindness to the children, so that there will always be a light in the hearts of the children.
First, every child has the eyes to find beauty
The story of "To Kill a Mockingbird" begins in a new semester, and the protagonist Lawyer Atticus's child, Scout, is about to enter the first grade, which is the Great Depression of the American economy, but these children will not know, they are still curious about everything around them.
The children's world is full of imagination and is always willing to inquire and make all kinds of rumors, and their neighbor is a strange person, which attracts the attention of the children. The strange man is called Radley, and the people of Colm Town are reluctant to talk about the Radley family, but there are rumors about the family.
But what really frightened Scutter and the other children was that one day Radley was working in the living room, and his father passed by, and Radley suddenly went crazy and stabbed his father in the thigh with scissors.
Soon the police sent Radley to a mental hospital, although the elder Radley did not sue his son, but since then the Radley family has begun to live in seclusion, it is difficult to see them again, the family is like a ghost in the night, the residents of the town are far away from them.
Khomlinsky said: "The child's heart is sensitive, it is open to accept all that is good. The little girl Scout and her brother Jem did not directly define the Radley family as "bad people" but were curious to find out.
So the two children always sneaked into the Yard of the Ladley family to see what kind of people the Radley family really was, and the children were more exploratory than adults, so it was easier to find things that everyone ignored.
Sure enough, the brothers and sisters' adventures discovered another side of the strange Radley family, which also had a lot of cute places.
There was a tall walnut tree in the yard of the Ladley family, and the brothers and sisters found that there were always small gifts in the tree hole, such as: chewing gum, figurines, medals, etc.
Not only that, when Jem escaped, his pants hung on the barbed wire and he returned home in his pants, but when Jem returned to find his pants the next day, he found that the pants were not only carefully folded and put into the tree hole, but also carefully sewn.
Hugo says, "A good heart is the sun, and the Radleys' little act of kindness lit up the world of the two children like sunshine. After constant trial and error, although everyone still thinks that the Radley family is strange, the essence of the family is cute and kind to the two children.
Fortunately, the children have their own judgment at a very young age, and do not easily make up their minds for a person because of the arrogance of the townspeople, but feel it with their own eyes.
Second, the responsibility of parents is to awaken the beauty of children's hearts
Socrates once asked his father, a master carver, "How can one become a good carver?" ”
The father pointed to the little lion that was being carved in his hand and said, "Look, in terms of this lion, I am not carving this lion, but awakening it!" ”
Each child is a unique individual, no matter how good or bad the academic performance, is an unpolished jade, containing unlimited potential, and parents are more like carvers, awakening the potential of children and shaping their future.
In "To Kill a Mockingbird", Mr. Atticus is an excellent father, he never blames his children for doing wrong things, but always patiently guides, and subtle education is like a beacon pointing out the direction for children.
Mr. Atticus was a servant, upright and kind, often defending the poor without pay, preferring to read books and newspapers at home rather than going out hunting, and spending a lot of time with his children to read and play with them.
Atticus attaches great importance to the cultivation of children's reading habits, and from a very young age, he took Scout to read together, which planted a beautiful seed in Scout's young heart.
What is even more worth learning is that Addix will not be like many parents, reading as a utilitarian thing, forcing children to memorize the big truth in the book by rote, for them reading like breathing is the need of life.
Atticus would take young Scout with him to read, and there was no limit to what he read, from all kinds of news in the newspapers, bills enacted, and even the priest's diary... These are words that children cannot understand, but they are the homework that Skout must do every day.
Under the influence of his father, little Scout did not know when he began to recognize words, and words were like an innate ability, which naturally became an inseparable part of life.
Atticus did not use preaching, but used silent companionship and persistence to awaken the curiosity of little Scout's heart, and invisibly formed his own judgment of the world.
However, compared with the educational philosophy at that time, Atticus's practices were obviously ahead of the curve, and Little Scutt had already read more than other children in the first grade, and could read normally, which was obviously beyond the scope of the school's professors, so the teacher began to forbid Addix to teach children to read.
What did Atticus do at this point? He did not forcibly change the child's reading habits, but patiently explained to the then 5-year-old Scutt why the teacher asked him to do so, and agreed with the child that as long as she regarded the matter as a secret between father and son, she could continue to read every night.
He was never a didactic about his children's education, and when everyone was far away from the strange Radley family, Atticus told the children: "Respect others like respecting yourself, respect monsters like angels." ”
When the people around him discriminated against black people, Atticus guided the child this way: "Unless you put on a person's shoes and walk around like him, you can never really understand a person." ”
Every heart has a scale, when you measure the world with kindness, the world will also give you back sincerity and kindness, Atticus with his own actions, to help the child to balance the scale in his heart.
Third, every child should have a light in his eyes
Soon there was a horrific rape case in the town, and the black young Man Tom was accused of raping the white girl MeyerRayur, if this incident happened now, it may not be so special, but at that time, the racial discrimination in The town of Maycomb was still very serious, so this matter caused a lot of controversy in the local area.
Due to racial prejudice, the residents thought that the rape of the white girl by the young black tom was an established fact, but Atticus resolutely stood up for Tom's defense.
Because Mr. Atticus believes that robins never do bad things, they never destroy everything around them, they just sing to us from the sidelines, and killing a robin is a sin.
The robin is a symbol of goodness and duty, and if a black man who has not committed a crime is to be sentenced to death, it is equivalent to killing a robin, and as a father, he is telling his child with his own insistence:
No matter how powerful the outside world is, even if you want to go with the flow, you must always keep the light in your heart, and do not fear the temporary darkness, because justice will be late but will never be absent.
This is easily reminiscent of the very hot Meng Wanzhou return event a while ago, Meng Wanzhou wrote such a paragraph on the charter flight back to China: "Where there is a five-star red flag, there is a beacon of faith, if the faith has color, it must be Chinese red!" ”
No matter how difficult it is, as long as there is faith, as long as you adhere to the inner norms, there will always be a day when you can keep the clouds open and see the moon, although the road back to China is extremely difficult, but Meng Wanzhou waited for that day, I believe that Mr. Atticus's children also felt the power of faith and justice.
Unfortunately, Black Tom did not last until the day of the appeal again, and the backlog of prejudice and rumors made him stop believing in the power of the law and chose to escape from prison, which cost him his precious life.
Although the ending is not satisfactory, Mr. Atticus, with his own persistence, has opened a gap for the small town of Maycombe, which is the light of hope that illuminates the future of the town and the light in the eyes of the children.
Nietzsche said: "Strong hope is a stimulant in life that is greater than any joy." "Although this world is very noisy, but with hope, the future is no longer dark, and the light in the eyes of children is the power to dispel darkness!"
I hope that every child can maintain that innocence in this noisy world, and in the eyes of adults, they can also have a little more childlike innocence, let go of the prejudices in their hearts, and have more understanding and tolerance for the world.