P86 2b
The Winning Team
Peter kept his eyes on the ground and felt a heavy weight on his shoulders as he walked home alone. It was the worst day of his life. His mind would not stop thinking about what happened only just an hour ago on the school soccer field. How could he have missed scoring that goal? He had let his whole team down. His stupid mistake made him angry. His team lost the game because of him. He was really worried that his coach may kick him off the team.
As soon as he walked through the door, his father asked, “What’s wrong, son?” Peter’s feelings were written all over his face. “I lost the game,” Peter replied. Then he went into his room without another word. Ten minutes later, Peter heard his father knocking on his bedroom door. He opened the door to let him in.
“Look, Peter. I don’t know what happened. But whatever it was, don’t be too hard on yourself.”
“I lost the game, Dad. I failed my team. They’ll probably never let me play again.” “Soccer is about team effort. You’re not the only reason your team lost. If you have a good team, you should support each other. Besides, winning or losing is only half the game. The other half is learning how to communicate with your teammates and learning from your mistakes.”
Peter didn’t say anything but what his father said made him think carefully.
The next day, Peter went to soccer practice with courage rather than fear in his heart.
“Hey, guys,” he said to his teammates. “I’m really sorry about yesterday. We were so close to winning that game. But I think if we continue to pull together, we’re going to win the next one.”
To his surprise and relief, his teammates all nodded in agreement.
“Yeah,” they said, “don’t worry about it. It’s never just one person’s fault. We should think about how we can do better next time.”
Peter smiled. It made him feel lucky to know that he was on a winning team.
Section B,2b
勝利之隊
彼得的眼睛盯著地面，當他一個人獨自走在回家路上的時候，覺得雙肩沉重。今天是他人生中最糟糕的日子。他腦海裡總停不住想一個小時以前學校足球場上發生的事。他怎麼錯過了進球呢？他讓全隊都失望了。他愚蠢的錯誤使他生氣。整個球隊因為他而輸掉了比賽。他還擔心教練會把他趕出球隊。
他一走進家門，他爸爸就問：“怎麼了，兒子？”彼得的情緒都寫在臉上。“我比賽輸了。”彼得回答。然後，他不再說話走進了自己的臥室。十分鐘後，彼得聽見爸爸在敲臥室門，他打開房門讓爸爸進來。
“彼得，你來看，我不知道發生了什麼。但不管結果怎樣，不要對自己太苛刻。”
“我輸球了，爸爸，我導致了球隊的失敗。很可能他們再也不會讓我踢球了。”“足球是靠團隊的集體努力，”你不是導致球隊失利的唯一原因。如果你們是一隻優秀的球隊，你們應該互相支持。此外，輸贏只是比賽的一半。另一半是學會怎樣和隊友合作，怎麼樣從錯誤中吸取教訓。”
彼得沒說什麼，但是爸爸的話使他陷入了沉思。
第二天，彼得並沒有害怕，而是勇敢地去參加了足球訓練。“嗨，夥伴們，”他對隊友說：“我對昨天的失誤非常抱歉，我們差點就贏了。但我想只要我們繼續團結一致，我們就會贏得下一場比賽。”
出乎意料而又讓他欣慰的是，他的隊友都贊同地點了頭。
“是的，”他們說：“別擔心了，失敗絕不是一個人的錯誤。我們應該考慮的是下一次我們怎麼能做得更好。”
彼得笑了。他為自己屬於一個奔向勝利的球隊感到慶幸。
