If we are not _______ the progress we have made, we will have greater success.

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　　If you look for a book as a present for a child, you will be spoiled for choice even in a year when there is no new Harry Potter．J．K．Rowling’s wizard is not alone：the past decade has been a harvest for good children’s books, which has set off a large quantity of films and in turn led to increased sales of classics such as The Lord of the Rings．

　　Yet despite that, reading is increasingly unpopular among children．According to statistics, in 1997 23％ said they didn’t like reading at all．In 2003, 35％ did．And around 6％ of children leave primary school each year unable to read properly．

　　Maybe the decline is caused by the increasing availability(可利用性)of computer games．Maybe the books boom(繁荣)has affected only the top of the educational pile．Either way, Chancellor Gordon Brown plans to change things for the bottom of the class．In his pre-budget(预算)report, he announced the national project of Reading Recovery to help the children struggling most．

　　Reading Recovery is aimed at six-year-olds, who receive four months of individual daily half- hour classes with a specially trained teacher．An evaluation earlier this year reported that children on the scheme made 20 months’ progress in just one year, whereas similarly weak readers without special help made just five months’ progress, and so ended the year even further below the level expected for their age．

　　International research tends to find that when British children leave primary school they read well, but read less－often for fun than those elsewhere．Reading for fun matters because children who are keen on(热衷)reading can expect lifelong pleasure and loving books is an excellent indicator(指示物)of future educational success．According to the OECD, being a regular and enthusiastic reader is of great advantage．