New-York tribune., 1922-03-19

T They find that their small neighboy
IS identified With an exercise of the
mouth signifying "boy" and "girT'
that it knows Of the identity Of things Is what
has been arbitrarily detached and presented.
That whole sub-strata of memories by which
even the young speaking child Identifies many
intangible things missing. It is long
time before the deaf child begins to sense in
tangible things.
In the beginning the journals are meager
little records. Nor do they ever curiousy
develop into such an outpouring of thoughts
and feelings as one might expect The fact Is,
his initiative in expression is never SO great
as that of the speaking child.
Still, even in the most meager journal. the
deaf child does convey, with an effect that any
primitivist poet will recognize. the ndispens-
able emotion. Here is a sample of second
year journal: 81 went to the store with my
father He bought an automobile. A man put
me in. l laughed"
There are few mistakes in grammar and
fewer IN spelling, and seldom such a thing as
accent. The deaf child is free at any rate
from the corruptions of speech to which the
speaking child is exposed and he seldom mis-
takes spelling because his conception of speech
is also ocular
1t is out of the easy confidence between
pupil and teacher that the child gets the indis-
pensable courage to ask for a term for in
visible and abstract things. 1t may happen
this way: A child may say, yesterday my
mother kissed my little brother. 1t made rns
very angry" "That is jealousy" answers tho
teacher. What is jealousy?" asks the child.
and the difficult job of the teacher is compi-
Gated by the need of adding new factor-the
moral factor-in her training. "You were rot
kind enough to let your mother love your
brother also" The child flushes with shame
and understands that there are barriers In
speech, too. ssssssss
The moral equation often begins much
earlier. David in the first year understood
perfectly the correct use of Eyes" and "no"
SIS Nathan a good boy?" asks the teacher,
pointing to a fellow pupil. mo- says David,
decisively. "Are you fat?" NO. comes tho
ringing answer, as he glances down his portly
little tum But ask David if he has a COW, q
horse, an elephant, mountain and wild horses
can drag no answer but Eyes" from him. He
feels intuitively that it is demeaning to lack
any of these indispensable possessi sions, and it
was only when the teacher invited him to ask
her these questions and replied in the negative
that David modified his boastfulness.
Intuition may not be there as aid, but q
very keen intelligence frequently is. Paul, in
the second year was taught the difference be-
tween Glove" and like and against ali re-
monstrance from that time henceforth would
., hot ho so
mother, but he only "likes" his father.
Dancing is an especially valuable part Of the
training, and all the children dance we'll. They
dance folk dances and ballroom dances, too
foxtrots and hesitation, with all the latest
catch steps How they keep to the broken
rhythm of these modern dances, to what un-
heard beat they keep time, it is hard to know,
but they lack nothing of aptness or grace.
Marian, child born deaf, does real fancy
dancing" as the school phrases it-intrcate
and difficult rhythmic patterns that one would
say were possible only to trained ear. Her
accomplishment is not so spectacular, but COM
parable in small measure to that of Lisa, one
of the Duncan dancers, who is also deaf
"We keep a piano going during general
dancing for our own pleasure" said one of the
teachers.
After ALL the finest thing that this or any
school do is to make the child feel himself
healthily and happily normal. And this the
School for the Deaf does little better, in spite
of the handicap, tnan the reguias --5lo
schools. Whether it is due to the :ndividual
nature of the instruction or because the whole
scheme is built on the child's need to ex-
press himself, or perhaps because the deaf
ol, = IL E. u Al 4
dsillusioning about him that the hearing child
cannot escape, it is hard to know. But these
are gentler and more gracious children, far
less self-conscious, timid and awkward than
hearing children, far more nearly what we like
to think OF as normal" In the long run their
handicap is not so great as it seems, and the
School for the Deaf has done great work an
reducing that handicap to minimum.