PREFACE

The mother of a little deaf child once wrote as follows: 

“As a mother of a deaf child, and one whose experience has been unusual only in that it has been more fortunate than that of the average mother so situated, I want to place before you (the teachers of the deaf) a plea for the education of the parents of little deaf children.

“While you are laboring for the education of the deaf, and for their sakes are training teachers to carry on the work, there are, in almost every home that shelters a little deaf child, blunders being made that will retard his development and hinder your work for years to come—­blunders that a little timely advice might prevent.  We parents are not willfully ignorant, not always stupidly so; but that we are in most cases densely so, there can be no doubt.

“Can you for the moment put yourselves into our place?  Suppose you are just the ordinary American parents, perhaps living far from the center of things.  You know in a hazy way that there are deaf and blind and other afflicted people—­perhaps you have seen some of them.

     “Now, into your home comes disease or a sudden awakening to the
     meaning of existing conditions, and you find that your child is
     deaf.

     “At first your thought is of physicians; they fail you.  Advice from
     friends and advertisements from quacks pour in upon you; still you
     find no comfort and no help.

“You stop talking to the child.  What is the use?  He cannot hear you!  You pity him—­oh, infinitely!  And your pity takes the form of indulgence.  You love him and you long to understand him; but you cannot interpret him and he feels the change, the helplessness in your attitude toward him.  You try one thing after another, floundering desperately in your effort to discover what radical step must be taken to meet this emergency.  After a time you seize upon the idea that seems to you the best.  Probably it is to wait until he is six or seven and then put him into an institution.  But while you wait for school age to arrive, you lose that close touch with the soul of your child which may be established only in these early years, for you have no adequate means of communication with him—­no way to win his confidence.  Soon the child has passed this stage, and no school can ever give him what you might and would have given had you known how.

“You who are trained teachers of the deaf can hardly realize the need of advice about matters perfectly obvious to you; but the need exists.  May I tell you from my own experience a few of the things about which you might advise—­you, who know!

     “In the first place, suggest to parents that they make simple
     tests of their children’s hearing; and tell them how and why those
     who are partially deaf should be helped.