MY TEACHER
Before Anne Sullivan came to our house, one or two people had told my mother that I was and idiot. I can understand why. Here was a seven-year-old girl who at the age of 19 months had become deaf and blind. And because I was deaf, I could not learn to speak. Struggling in a world of silence and darkness, I did seem like an idiot.But this was before Anne Sullivan came to stay. She was a lively young woman with patience and imagination. A born teacher, she dreamed of turning a deaf-blind creature into a useful human being.
What a challenge I must have been to this young teacher! I remember the many times she tried to spell words into my small hand. But neither words nor letters meant anything to me. I thought her finger movements were some kind of game. But at last, on April 5, 1887, she reached my understanding. About a month after her arrival, she taught me the wood “water.”
It happened at the well where I was holding a jug while Annie pumped. As the water splashed onto my hand, she kept spelling w-a-t-e-r into my other hand with her fingers. Suddenly I understood!
It was the first joy I had known for years. I reached out to Annie’s hand. She understood I was begging for new words, for the names of the things I touched. The words – so full of meaning – flew from her hand to mine. Those first words were to change my world.
One of the first things Annie did was to teach me how to play. I had not laughed since I became deaf. One day she came into my room laughing merrily. Putting my hand on her face, she spelled l-a-u-g-h. Then she tickled me into a burst of laughter. Next Annie took me by the hand and taught me how to hop and skip. She then immediately spelled the words h-o-p and s-k-i-p for me. In a few days I was learning – and enjoying it – like any child.
Annie kept some pigeons in a cage so that when they were let out I might feel the air from their wings. In this way I found out how birds could fly. The pigeons would land on my head and shoulders. I learned to feed them and understand their ways. That is why birds, though I could not see them, have always been as much a part of my world as flowers and stones.
Teacher would not let the world about me be silent. Through my hands and fingers, I “heard” the sounds that one hears on a farm, the noises made by cows, horses, chickens, pigs. She brought me into touch with everything that could be reached or felt – sunlight, the rustling of silk, the noises of insects, the creaking of a door, the voice of a loved one.
Annie treated me exactly as if I were a seeing and hearing child. As soon as I had enough words to know the difference between right and wrong, I was put to bed whenever I did something wrong. How wonderful to be treated like a normal child, even when I was bad!
As I took back upon those years, I am struck by Annie’s wisdom. Perhaps she understood me because she herself had always had very weak eyes.
Annie was born in a poor family, on April 4, 1866. Her mother died when she was eight years old. Two years later, her father disappeared, never to be heard from again. Annie and her brother were sent to a house for orphans. There the boy died.
No one outside the orphans’ home was interested in Annie, who was almost blind. But finally, after four years, she managed to escape by crying out to a group of visitors, “I want to go to school!” At an institution for the blind, Annie learned Braille. This is a kind of printing for blind people so that they can read by touch. She also learned a kind of alphabet for the blind, in which different finger positions stand for different letters of the alphabet.
Later, an operation helped her to get back part of her sight, but she remained at her institution for six years more. There she studied about teaching deaf-blind children.
One day a letter from my father arrived at the school. It asked for a teacher for me. Annie considered the challenge just the one she wanted. That is how Annie came to be with us.
Annie was among the first to realize that a blind person never knows his hidden strength until he is treated like a normal human being. She never pitied me; she never praised me unless what I did was as good as that of the best of a normal person. And she encouraged me when I made up my mind to go to college.
During my years in school, Annie sat beside me in every class. She spelled out for me the things that the teachers taught. And, because most books were not printed in Braille, she herself read them to me by spelling into my hand what was written in the books.
Teacher’s eyes were always a problem. “I can’t see an inch ahead,” she once told me. A doctor was shocked when he heard that she read to me five or more hours every day. Because of this, I often pretended to remember parts of books that I had forgotten, so that she wouldn’t have to reread them to me.
It took great imagination as well as patience for Annie to teach me to speak. Putting both my hands on her face when she spoke, she let me feel all the movements of her lips and throat. Together we repeated and repeated words and sentences.
My speech was clumsy and not pleasant to hear. But I was delighted to be able to say words that my family and a few friends could understand. To Annie I owe thanks for this priceless gift of speech. It has helped me to serve others
Teachers inspiration lived on after her death. She had believed in me. I must always keep on trying to do my best.
“No matter what happens,” she often said, “keep on beginning. Each time you fail, start all over again. You will grow stronger each time, until you can do and finish what you started out to do.” Who could count the times Annie tried, failed, and then conquered?
What a great teacher! What a great person!
1. 本课课文是从海伦.凯勒(Helen Keller)所著《我的一生》(The Story of My Life)中选取一段，略加删节。
海伦.凯勒1880年生于美国。她十九个月的时候，因病丧失了视力、听力和说话的能力。七岁时，她在一位盲人教师的耐心帮助下，开始学习手语字母和布莱叶盲文，后来还学会了用嘴讲话，用手“听话”。二十四岁时，她以优异的成绩毕业于哈佛大学拉德克利夫（Radcliffe）女子学院。她把自己的毕生精力和学识倾注到为本国和世界盲人、聋哑人谋利益的事业中，给世界上很多人，包括残疾人和健康人，以力量和鼓舞。 snnr 发表于 2022-11-18 18:13
1. 本课课文是从海伦.凯勒(Helen Keller)所著《我的一生》(The Story of My Life)中选取一段，略加删 ...
听过海伦的事迹，很是感人 simonzhd 发表于 2022-11-18 18:29
听过海伦的事迹，很是感人
嗯嗯 Thanks for yr sharing 释清心 发表于 2022-11-28 20:34
Thanks for yr sharing
不客气
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