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A VALUABLE STUDY FOR TEACHERS OF THE DEAF.

(Silent Educator, Flint, Mich., June, 1892.)

The great problem that confronts us in this country is, how to impart to the deaf a knowledge of idiomatic English. It must be admitted by all who have come in contact with Helen Keller that this problem has been solved in the case of at least one deaf child, not yet twelve years of age; and I therefore agree with the opinion expressed in the May number of THE SILENT EDUCATOR, that teachers of the deaf should study very carefully the method of instruction pursued in the case of Helen Keller. The difficulty of the problem must have been enormously increased in her case, by the fact that she has been totally blind, as well as deaf, from infancy. On the other hand, her unusual intellectual abilities have been of undoubted advantage.

We must not run away with the idea, however, that exceptional intellectual powers could alone account for the phenomenon. No mind, however richly endowed, could possibly arrive intuitively at a knowledge of idiomatic English expressions. It is absolutely certain that such expressions must have been taught to her before she could use them. It is, then, a question of instruction that we have to consider, and not a case of supernatural acquirement. Among the thousands of children in our schools for the deaf who are not hampered by the additional misfortune of blindness, there are surely some who are intellectually as capable of mastering the intricacies of the English language as Helen herself.

If, then, we can find none who have in an equal period of time acquired a knowledge of idiomatic English comparable to hers, we should seek the explanation in the difference between the methods of instruction employed. Let every teacher compare Miss Sullivan's statements with the methods of instruction now in use, and note the difference.

In the first place, it is obvious that Helen's remarkable command of language is not due to any knowledge of the sign language; for she knows nothing of it. Nor is it due to oral instruction; for she had acquired complete mastery of the English language before she was taught to speak. Miss Sullivan's method approximates most closely to the "American Vernacular Method" used in the Western New York Institution. She employed the manual alphabet exclusively as a means of communication up to the period when Helen was taught to speak. She adopted the principle of talking to Helen just as she would to a seeing and hearing child, spelling into her hands the words and sentences she would have spoken to her if she could have heard, in spite of the fact that at first much of the language was unintelligible to the child. She did not pick and choose her words, but by frequent repetition of complete sentences containing ordinary idiomatic expressions, she sought to impress the language upon the child's memory and thus lead her gradually to imitate it.

The chief difference between Miss Sullivan's method and that pursued in the Western New York Institution is to be found in the use she has made of books as a means of teaching the language. Miss Sullivan says:

"I gave her books printed in raised letters long before she could read them, and she would amuse herself for hours each day in carefully passing her fingers over the words searching for such as she knew, and would scream with delight whenever she found one."

Before, then, Helen had the ability to understand very much of the English language, complete words and sentences containing ordinary idiomatic expressions were constantly presented to her sense of touch in two ways:

1. By the conversation of her teacher.

2. By the presentation of books.

The first plan is substantially the method adopted in the Rochester school; but the second is unique, and has never before, to my knowledge, been put into practical operation; although the idea is familiar to the profession and has been frequently discussed from a theoretical point of view. It is safe to say that no pupil of the Rochester school, however brilliantly endowed in mind, has exhibited a knowledge of the English language comparable to that possessed by Helen after an equal period of instruction; hence, the second plan adopted by Miss Sullivan is probably responsible for the difference of result.

This conclusion is confirmed by the fortunate discovery by the Goodson Gazette of the origin of much of the language employed in Helen's remarkable story of the " Frost King." Indeed, this discovery has given us the key to the solution of the problem in Helen's case, and we may now hold it as conclusively proved that she owes her exceptional knowledge of language largely to the influence of books. She talks and writes the language of the books she has read, or the books that have been read to her by spelling the words into her hand. In nearly all her compositions we can trace this influence. Miss Sullivan says:

"In selecting books for Helen to read it has never occurred to me to choose them with reference to her misfortune. I have read to her such publications as other children of her age read and take delight in, and the same rule has been observed in placing in her hands books, printed in raised letters. * * * In regard to the quantity and quality of books furnished Helen before she knew many words, I cannot give a list that will be of much value to teachers of the deaf, as on account of Helen's double misfortune she could not be supplied, as deaf children can who have the sense of sight, with a selection from the almost limitless number of beautifully printed and illustrated books for children of all ages which our book stores so generously display."