泰国的“红衫军”刚刚消停几天，我们今天又讨论幼儿园里的“红衫军”了。别紧张，此“红衫军”跟暴力一点儿关系都没有，而是小朋友们学习上的事儿。

Redshirting refers to the practice of holding a child out of kindergarten for one year in the hope that the child will then do better academically and socially. This term comes from the common practice of redshirting freshman college athletes, which means keeping them out of competition for a year to develop their skills.

Redshirting指让正在上幼儿园的孩子停学一年，期望一年后孩子在学习和社交方面的表现能够有所提高，我们可以称之为“红衫行为”（跟我们通常说的 “休学”意思差不多）。Redshirting这个说法来源于大学运动员的一个惯例，即刚入校的队员需要有一年的时间参加技能训练，不能参加正式比赛（这些运动员被称为“红衫队员”）。

The rise of redshirting dates to the 1980s, when mandatory testing put pressure on schools to make the early elementary grades more rigorous. As 3rd and 4th grade became more demanding, kindergarten had to keep up. Savvy parents were increasingly likely to worry about their children's early academic performance and resort to redshirting. Academic redshirting is a result of higher expectations of kindergartners, some educators say.

从二十世纪80年代开始，这种“红衫行为”开始增多，因为当时学校面临考试体制的压力，对小学初级阶段的课程要求更加严格。由于三、四年级就开始要求比较高，所以幼儿园阶段就得抓紧。有头脑的家长们开始为孩子早期的学习成绩担心，并考虑让孩子进入“红衫状态”，即“休学”。有教育专家表示，课业学习方面的“红衫行为”其实是幼儿园方面对孩子们期望过高导致的。

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（中国日报网英语点津 Helen 编辑）

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