We are assigned to get involved in the activity to read a good book in our winter holiday, which I think is greatly meaningful.

Yours,

Li Hua

For much of history, reading was a fairly noisy activity. On clay tablets(泥板) in ancient Iraq and Syria some 4,000 years ago, the     1     (common) used words for “to read” literally meant “to cry out” or “to listen”.

Today, silent reading is the rule. The majority of us bottle the words in our heads as if     2     (sit) in the hushed(宁静的) confines(范围) of a library. What people read aloud     3     (limit) to bedtime stories and performances.

But a growing body of research suggests that we may be missing out by reading words only     4     the voices inside our minds. Actually, the ancient art of reading aloud has a number of benefits for adults, from helping improve our memories and understand complex texts, to the emotional bonds between people.

In the past few years, Colin MacLeod,     5     Psychologist at the University of Waterloo in Canada,     6     (research) the impact of reading aloud on memory extensively. He and his collaborators have drawn the     7     (conclude) that people consistently remember words and texts better if they read them aloud than if they read them silently.

In another study, adults     8     (age) 67 to 88 were given the same task — reading words either silently or aloud and then writing down     9     they could remember. They were able to recall 27% of the words read aloud, but only 10% of     10     read silently.

6 . Not long ago, Linda Khan was sitting by a hospital bed in Houston, feeling ill at ease. Beside her lay her father who needed a heart surgery. The two of them had engaged in nothing but depressing small talks. Then, her eye fell on a pile of books. She picked up one, and started to read it out loud. "Right away, it changed the mood and atmosphere, “she says. Reading gave the daughter a way to connect with her father. Listening allowed the father travel on the sound of his daughter's voice into a place where he felt himself again. "From then on, Khan says, “I always read to him.”

In a 2010 survey in the United Kingdom, elderly adults who joined weekly read-aloud groups reported better concentration, less anxiety, and an improved ability to socialize. The survey authors owed these improvements in large part to the “rich, varied diet of serious literature” that group members consumed, with fiction encouraging feelings of relaxation and calm, poetry fostering focused concentration, and narratives giving rise to cognitive (认知的)thoughts, feelings, and memories. In truth, almost any kind of reading to another person can be beneficial.

Readers get rewards too. For Neil Bush, the late-life hospitalizations of his famous parents, George H. W. and Barbara Bush, became opportunities to repay a debt of gratitude. "When I was a kid, they would read to me, “he said. With his parents in and out of care, “We’ve been reading books about Dad’s foreign policy and, more recently, Mom’s autobiography.” Bush went on, his voice thick with emotion, "And reading their amazing life to them has been a remarkable blessing to me, personally, as their son.”

To many people, reading to parents may seem so far outside the normal range of regular activities, and it may even feel odd(奇怪的)and improper. However, there are still a lot many who brave the momentary strangeness of reading to elderly adults and both readers and listeners are, to borrow a phrase from Wordsworth, surprised by the joy of it.

As a combination of “sound” and “sense”, poetry usually implies a deeper meaning beyond the words on the page. So, how to understand poetry easily and     1     (thorough)?

Firstly, follow your ears. When beginning to read a poem aloud, it is better     2     (ask) “How does it sound?” Focus     3     its rhythm, repeated words or other special effects,     4     will help you have a better understanding of the poem in the end. Secondly, approach the poem as if you were     5     explorer in an unfamiliar landscape. Ask some basic     6     (question) about the poem. As you slowly explore your surroundings, you     7     (dig) up clues that give you a better understanding of the poem. Thirdly, if you are still struggling to interpret the meaning of a poem, even with much painstaking effort, just have a little bit     8     (patient). Generally speaking, a poem can not     9     (understand) if you only read it once. Finally, remember that you don’t have to fully understand a poem to appreciate it. You might need to abandon     10     (it) true inner beauty. As long as the journey to poetry reading makes you feel something or lets you perceive another level of meaning, it is worth your effort.