The morning news. [volume] (Savannah, Ga.) 1887-1900, 1897-06-13
EDUCATING THE NEGATIVE EAn
Training of Children with This AZ
hictfOn.
From the Chicago Tribune.

From the Chicago Tribune.
The education of the negative" ear is
to be made a speciality in Chicago. For
some time there has been a school con-
Quoted In the city where children afflicted
with this strange trouble received train
ing, but though much attention was paid
to the negative ear there were numer-
GUS other branches of instruction carried
on-developing imperfect speech and the
like-and the work was divided. Now,
however, Mrs. Lounsbury the discoVerer
Of the negative" ear, has decided to de-
vote her efforts to that especially.
The discovery of the nature of the me
gative" ear is a comparatively recent one,
and was made by Mrs. Lounsbury through
one of her pupils in a deaf mute asylum.
For ten years Mrs. Lounsbury had been
training the inmates Of the asylum in ar
ticulation without the least suspicion that
one, at least, Of her pupils could hear,
though without approaching the different
shades of tone. That sound was at all
perceptible disproved the supposition that
the pupil was a deaf mute. Mrs. Louns.
bury investigated the case and discovered
the negative ear, which she calls a
sort Of color blindness Of the ear" a lack
of the appreciation of sounds, though the
sounds are heard. The sense of apprecia-
ton of the different shades of tone is Of
ACli 81 utterly idthlHS al a Clillu liltli III
stead of learning to speak as other chill
dren do, it constructs from the imperfect
~ heard sounds a language of its own so
wholly unintelligible to any one else that
it resembles the chickering's of idiots. In
deed, many cases have been found where
children have been sent to an idiot asylum
on no stronger evidence than this Still
more often they never learn to make any
sounds at all. and are turned over to the
institutions for deaf mutes.
To educate such children as deaf mutes
deprives them of nearly all power to
achieve success in life; to treat them as
predetermined is even worse. But until
within a few years their case was not
understood.
In California institution for deaf mutes
Mrs. Lounsbury discovered nine children
possessed Of the negative" ear. They
could near as well as any one, hear even
a whisper, but they We're utterly unable to
discern shades Of tone, and so could not
understand language. In an eastern
school she once found a young woman
who had spent almost her whole life in the
institution, had learned the sign language
and lip-reading, and yet could hear per-
fectly. Had this fact been discovered ear
ly in life, six months or a years training
would have fitted her to enter the public
schools and obtain an education with
other children. But she had never made
and mute.
Among the pupils afflicted in this way
now receiving instruction in speech there
are two particularly interesting cases. One
is that of a small boy of u years, whose
parents thought him an idiot and whose
language is SO twisted and filed with SUBJ
stitutions of incorrect sounds that no one
who has not made study of his attempts
can understand what he says. Yet he
is bright, active and laxative, and thinks
he can talk-a common delusion among
persons so troubled. He has been study
ing now only two weeks, but already hisc
speech is becoming better, and one or two
words spoken in every sentence are clearly
spoken. The other is that of a Young
man, who had grown to manhood speaking
a language wholly unintelligble to others,
but without finding out what was the mat
ter with him. In a month he has learned
to talk fairly well, and in few months
more will be in a position to enter upon ac-
tive business life.
The method of curing the negative" ear
Is no less strange than the trouble itself.
II Is, OF course, impossible to teach the
child through words spoken by others, or
1t would have learned in the natural man
ner. Instead, the process is reversed. The
enid is taught to speak correctly by! In
structing it in the positions of the mouth
and tongue, and the words spoken are
Hdue 10 teach the ear. The child'S own
tongue cultivates its ear. No other tongue
can do It,
There is as yet no public institution any,
where for the treatment of this strange
disorder but those interested in the saving
or such children from the idiot and deaf
mute asylums hope for an appropriation to
establish school in Illinois for the treat
ment OF those whose parents are too poor
to obtain help in any other way The
need q &c
Lounsbury thinks, by the fact that she has
received an average of fifty letters from
each state in the union, written by parents
OF children possessed of negative ears.
but too poor to send them to q private
school for treatment.