Quote:
Originally posted by MoonStar17
Also, younger children who are being read HP might get lost in the words, still somewhat older children will be able to figure it out if they are reading the words and are able to understand the context of the passage and/or sentence.
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I actually think the opposite is true. Younger children, who are new to reading, are used to coming across words they don't know in books, and since they're often too lazy to get a dictionary and look the word up, they'll just assume what it means from the context. (I did this all the time as a kid, lol!) The younger readers won't understand that "wonky" isn't used in America -- they'll just think it's another word they don't know and they'll assume the meaning from the context. The older readers, who know that "wonky" isn't an American word, are the ones that have more trouble with it.
I think an interesting compromise would be to print the British version but with a British/American translator in the book so kids could look up that crazy British slang and figure it out themselves, rather than having it all done for them.