वाचनाचे वेड Passion for Reading

सोनालीला पाठ्यपुस्तकांशिवाय इतर पुस्तके वाचण्याची अजिबात आवड नव्हती. ती टीव्ही, व्हिडिओ गेम्स आणि मोबाईलमध्ये रमलेली असे. तिची आई मात्र वाचनाची खूप शौकीन होती आणि तिला सोनालीने वाचावे असे वाटायचे, पण तिचे प्रयत्न यशस्वी होत नव्हते.

The opening of the lesson paints a picture of Sonali's disinterest in reading. She felt no pull towards anything beyond her school textbooks, because her attention was firmly captured by on-screen entertainment - television, video games and the mobile phone. Her mother, by contrast, was an avid reader, and her repeated efforts to draw her daughter into the same habit kept falling short.

एके दिवशी आईने युक्ती केली. तिने सांगितले की तिला शाळेत पाहुणी म्हणून गोष्ट सांगायची आहे, म्हणून सोनालीने पुस्तकातून एक चांगली गोष्ट निवडून द्यावी. आईला मदत करायची व त्यामुळे बाईंकडून शाबासकी मिळेल या विचाराने सोनालीने लगेच पुस्तक हातात घेतले.

Then one day the mother tries a clever trick. Instead of directly demanding that she read, she poses a different kind of task to her daughter - there is an event at school where she needs to narrate a story to children, and she hands Sonali the responsibility of finding a suitable one from the book. Reasoning that this would count as helping her mother and might also earn her praise from her teacher, Sonali takes on the task.

एक गोष्ट निवडणे कठीण वाटल्याने सोनालीने एकामागोमाग जवळजवळ दहा गोष्टी वाचल्या. वाचता-वाचता तिला पुढच्या गोष्टीत काय आहे याची उत्सुकता वाटू लागली, आणि तिने कधी पूर्ण पुस्तक वाचून संपवले हे तिलाही कळले नाही.

Unable to decide which story to pick just from reading the titles, Sonali reluctantly read almost ten stories one after another. As she kept reading the stories in the book, her curiosity about what came next grew steadily, and without realizing it her boredom disappeared. She finished the entire book without even noticing when it happened.

हळूहळू सोनालीत मोठा बदल झाला. ती स्वतःहून वाचनालयात जाऊन पुस्तके वाचू लागली, वर्गात गोष्टी सांगू लागली आणि आवडलेल्या ओळी वहीत लिहू लागली. हा बदल पाहून घरातील सगळ्यांना आनंद झाला आणि सोनालीला खऱ्या अर्थाने वाचनाचे वेड लागले.

That one small trick brings about a lasting shift in Sonali's character. The girl who once wouldn't touch anything beyond her schoolbooks now heads to the library of her own accord, eagerly retells the stories she has read to her classmates, and keeps a special notebook for jotting down passages that move her. Watching this, the family feels a quiet sense of fulfilment, for a girl has now become a genuine, lifelong lover of books.