The Story of My Life: With her letters (1887-1901) and a supplementary account of her education, including passages from the reports and letters of her teacher, Anne Mansfield Sullivan, by John Albert MacyKeller, Helen
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The Story of My Life: With her letters (1887-1901) and a supplementary account of her education, including passages from the reports and letters of her teacher, Anne Mansfield Sullivan, by John Albert Macy
Keller, Helen
Deafblind women -- United States -- Biography; Keller, Helen, 1880-1968
I now thought it time to teach her to read printed words. A slip on
which was printed, in raised letters, the word BOX was placed on the
object, and the same experiment was tried with a great many articles,
but she did not immediately comprehend that the label-name represented
the thing. Then I took an alphabet sheet and put her finger on the
letter A, at the same time making A with my fingers. She moved her
finger from one printed character to another as I formed each letter on
my fingers. She learned all the letters, both capital and small, in one
day. Next I turned to the first page of the primer and made her touch
the word CAT, spelling it on my fingers at the same time. Instantly she
caught the idea, and asked me to find DOG and many other words. Indeed,
she was much displeased because I could not find her name in the
book. Just then I had no sentences in raised letters which she could
understand; but she would sit for hours feeling each word in her book.
When she touched one with which she was familiar, a peculiarly sweet
expression lighted her face, and we saw her countenance growing sweeter
and more earnest every day. About this time I sent a list of the words
she knew to Mr. Anagnos, and he very kindly had them printed for her.
Her mother and I cut up several sheets of printed words so that she
could arrange them into sentences. This delighted her more than anything
she had yet done; and the practice thus obtained prepared the way for
the writing lessons. There was no difficulty in making her understand
how to write the same sentences with pencil and paper which she made
every day with the slips, and she very soon perceived that she need not
confine herself to phrases already learned, but could communicate any
thought that was passing through her mind. I put one of the writing
boards used by the blind between the folds of the paper on the table,
and allowed her to examine an alphabet of the square letters, such as
she was to make. I then guided her hand to form the sentence, "Cat does
drink milk." When she finished it she was overjoyed. She carried it to
her mother, who spelled it to her.
Day after day she moved her pencil in the same tracks along the grooved
paper, never for a moment expressing the least impatience or sense of
fatigue.
As she had now learned to express her ideas on paper, I next taught her
the braille system. She learned it gladly when she discovered that she
could herself read what she had written; and this still affords her
constant pleasure. For a whole evening she will sit at the table writing
whatever comes into her busy brain; and I seldom find any difficulty in
reading what she has written.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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