What the Mother of a Deaf Child Ought to Know | Page 7

learn them, by constant repetition at times and under circumstances when the meaning is obvious. Such as "come," "go," "go to papa," "come to mamma," "jump," "stop," "kiss mother," "pet pussy," "pick up," "put down," "milk," "water," "bread" (the later in life that he learns the meaning and taste of "candy" the better), "do you want some bread?" "milk," "water," etc. "Bring my slippers," "bring my shoes," "put on your hat," "take off your mittens," "wash your hands," etc., etc., throughout the whole day.
Very early the mother should learn to consider the direction from which the light comes, and should be careful to take her position facing the main source of light which should come from behind the child. The eye can be trained from the very beginning of attention to unconsciously supplement an imperfect ear in comprehending spoken words. It is even possible for the eye to perform the entire task of interpreting speech, and, if the hearing is entirely lacking, the course outlined will result in training the brain to interpret the movements of speech as seen by the eye, as it would have been trained by the same procedure to interpret the sounds of speech had the organ of transmission not been injured. But the idea must be constantly in the mind of the mother that her boy needs to see the spoken word at the very moment _when the idea that it represents is in his mind_, AS OFTEN as he would hear it if his hearing were perfect.
This one suggestion, if faithfully lived up to from the age of one year to that of two years, would be almost enough. But there are other things that the mother can do as the mental development of the baby increases with each month of life. She should encourage him to babble and gurgle and murmur, as much as possible, to laugh and crow and make all the various baby noises that will train and develop his voice. Encourage noisy, romping, rollicking games as he gets older, that make him shout and call, for they are the natural and best voice exercises.

IV
WHAT ABOUT THE BABY'S SPEECH?
The hearing baby babbles because he gets some pleasure from the sounds, and also because he desires to imitate the sounds of speech he hears around him. He has his attention called constantly to sound. The sense of vibration is not as strong nor as instructive as that of sound, but if the attention of the child is early called to it, a watchfulness for vibration from within himself as well as from without, can be aroused, and a sensitiveness developed that would not have come as early, if at all, without special, directive effort on the part of the mother. She can lead her little one to oo-oo, and ee-ee, and mamma, and bub-bub, etc., by doing these babblings herself while the baby is in her arms and his tiny hands are wandering over her lips and face and throat. These exercises will gradually bring a recognition on the part of the child of the sensation of vibration that accompanies voice, and they will give facility, coupled with the normal and natural intonations that have been acquired when he was not conscious of any effort, that will prepare him for a better and more fluent speech when the time comes for more exact articulation training.
But during the first two or three years of the child's life the principal stress should be placed upon his learning to understand what is said to him, without bothering much about his speaking himself. In the case of the hearing child, the understanding of language comes before he can himself utter it. This must also be the case with the deaf child, and the period preceding utterance must be longer, by reason of his handicap, than in the case of a child with normal hearing.

V
DEVELOPING THE MENTAL FACULTIES
By the time he is two years old he has gained maturity and grasp enough to play many little educational games with his mother and his little brothers and sisters, or playmates. These games should be calculated to develop his various faculties, his powers of observation, memory, and concentration. To develop a faculty is really to train the brain. As a matter of fact, we see and hear and taste and smell and feel with our brains. The eye of a two-year-old child is practically as perfect an optical instrument as the eye of a boy of ten, and yet how much more the older boy seems to see. This is because his brain has been trained to interpret the impressions that even the baby eyes received but did not understand. Of course, where the instrument is found to be imperfect we can assist it by means of additional lenses,