How Exactly Did Anne Sullivan Teach Helen Keller To Communicate?

Stricken deaf, blind, and mute by a childhood illness, Helen Keller learned to read, write, and speak thanks to the efforts of her miracle working instructor, Ann Sullivan, who also became a friend and companion. But how exactly did Sullivan manage to connect with a student who couldn't see or hear? Well, today we're going to take a look at how the miracle worker, Ann Sullivan, taught Helen Keller to communicate. But before we get started, be sure to subscribe to the Weird History channel. After that, leave a comment and let us know what other inspiring topics you would like to hear about next. OK, time to study up on a famous teacher. Anne Sullivan was born in 1866 to poor, illiterate Irish immigrants in Massachusetts. She was one of only two children out of five to make it to adulthood, and she lost her mother to tuberculosis when she was just nine. Her father was an alcoholic, and shortly after her mother's death, he took Anne to live in Tewksbury's almshouse, a nearby poorhouse. Meanwhile, due to a bacterial infection of the eyes called trachoma, Anne lost most of her sight at the age of five. But had several eye surgeries to try and repair the damage. The point is, she knew a thing or two about being disabled and seemingly stuck in a hopeless situation. In 1880, after personally pleading with the state of Massachusetts, Ann Sullivan was sent to the Perkins School for the Blind. The other students at the Perkins School teased her because she was so poor. But Ann focused on learning and established close relationships with several of her teachers. Sullivan was smart, and she quickly caught up intellectually. For her, that meant learning how to communicate as a blind person, as well as with students at the school who were both blind and deaf. She learned fingerspelling and palm writing, the latter of which would turn out to be an essential tool for her future student, Helen Keller. Thanks to her surgeries, Anne slowly regained her sight. By the end of 1882, she was able to read print off of a page. She continued to study at Perkins. And in 1886, she graduated as valedictorian of her class. Before Helen Keller, there was Laura Bridgman. Not that it was a competition. Bridgman was the first blind and deaf English speaker to learn to communicate using fingerspelling and writing. Due to a childhood case of scarlet fever, she lost not only her sight and hearing, but also her sense of smell and most of her sense of taste. Bridgman had developed her own method of using movements to communicate with her family. In 1837, she went to the school that would later be the Perkins School for the Blind. Where she was taught through a series of gestures, hand signals, and block writing exercises. Bridgman learned words and spelling through raised print on pages. And by 1850, she was studying subjects like history, philosophy, mathematics, writing, and geography. She acquired international fame after her teacher published a paper on his methods and even caught the attentions of intellectuals like Charles Dickens. If there's one person who appreciated a story of childhood hardship, it was Dickens. When Sullivan went to Perkins in 1880, Bridgman had been there for almost 50 years. And Sullivan learned how to communicate with Bridgman and read to her often. When she was just 19 months old, Helen Keller was stricken with an unknown illness that took her hearing and sight. Keller had been an inquisitive and intelligent child. But now, unable to communicate, she turned into a frustrated and angry toddler. Sometimes, Helen tried to communicate with grunts and gestures. But other times, she just threw tantrums, which is understandable. Grown adults throw tantrums when Panera is out of bagels. So Helen was more than entitled to her meltdowns. Luckily for her, her parents were wealthy, educated, and desperate to find a way to help her. But they didn't want to have her institutionalized. After Helen's mother read Charles Dickens' description of Laura Bridgman in American Notes, the Kellers became inspired by Bridgman's achievements and felt some hope for Helen's prospects. The couple reached out to a number of doctors and were eventually referred to Alexander Graham Bell, who was not a doctor. But Bell had been working with deaf children in Washington DC, and he recommended the Kellers contact the Perkins School for the blind. Arthur Keller wrote to the school, and they, in turn, sent their star pupil, Ann Sullivan, to work with Helen. 21-year-old Ann Sullivan arrived at the Keller home in Alabama on March 3rd, 1887. The Helen she met that day was a defiant, violent, and often abusive seven-year-old. Right off the bat, Sullivan began spelling words into Keller's hand to identify them and try to help her understand. The frustrated Keller, for her part, mostly just kicked, screamed, and threw things, like she was at Ozzfest. Ann also quickly learned that Helen had no manners, especially when it came to meals. In one incident, Keller tried to grab food off Sullivan's plate, which was a common occurrence in the house. Sullivan smacked Keller's hand with a spoon repeatedly until Keller stopped trying. The tantrum that followed was fierce, but Sullivan simply ignored it and continued with her meal. Sullivan had a reputation of being stubborn while she was at Perkins. But now she knew how to use her stubbornness as a teaching tool, which made her a good match for her new student. To teach Helen, Sullivan employed the methods Laura Bridgman had used along with other techniques she learned at Perkins. This included things like spelling the names of items into Keller's hand. But Keller remained confused. Thankfully, she had a breakthrough. Sullivan spelled W-A-T-E-R into Keller's hand one day and then placed that same hand into water. Keller immediately understood that all things had names and thus began to grasp the basics of language. After that, she wanted to know the names for everything. Within a matter of weeks after her water epiphany, Keller had soaked up words for over 100 objects, as well as for several actions and concepts. Keller's curiosity and pronounced desire to learn led Sullivan to abandon the traditional ideas of structured lessons. Instead, the two spent as much time outside as possible. Keller responded to sunlight on her face and liked to smell and touch flowers, trees, and whatever else she could find. She would later reflect on those outdoor experiences, saying, all my early lessons have in them the breath of the woods, the fine, resinous odor of pine needles blended Ended with the perfume of wild grapes. Man, all the classrooms we were in smelled like shoes. Keller would later say she thought of these experiences as learning from life itself. Through Sullivan, Keller learned the basics of arithmetic, which she did not particularly enjoy, as well as botany and zoology. She also began to write. After that, she wrote to everyone. She wrote to the director of the Perkins School, to family members, and she even struck up a correspondence with Alexander Graham Bell. Which apparently was a thing everyone could do in those days. Guess he was in the phone book. By 1890, Keller was learning the fundamentals of speech at the Perkins School. She was determined to practice the sound she learned by touching the lips, cheeks, and throat of her instructor. With repetition and determination, Keller was able to talk to her family on her next visit home, rendering them silent in awe and pride. Helen would later recall her eyes filled with tears as her mother pressed her close and took in every syllable. Her sister Mildred held her hand and kissed it and started dancing, while her father expressed his pride and affection in a big silence. It was a genuine Hallmark moment, although Hallmark wouldn't actually exist for another two decades. With Keller, Sullivan had created a spelling monster. Helen wanted to spell words so often, Sullivan literally couldn't keep up with her. And when Keller couldn't find anyone to talk to, she just talked to herself. According to Sullivan, Keller began to spell the minute she woke up in the morning and continued all day long. If Sullivan refused to talk to her, Helen would spell into her own hand. Sullivan even observed that Keller would carry on lively conversations with herself. Which might be one of the biggest indicators of Sullivan's success as a teacher. Keller had become so accustomed to language that she spoke to herself, which is a thing everyone does constantly, all day long. And while Sullivan was careful not to let Keller withdraw into herself, the practice became so ingrained that Keller grew to do it without even realizing it. Sullivan and Keller made their first trip to the Perkins School in Boston in 1888. The visit enabled Keller to interact with other blind and deaf children. And Keller began to spend her winters at the school, along with taking trips to see members of Keller's family. Sullivan felt the trips were necessary to help Keller experience the world. Both Sullivan and Keller left Perkins for good in 1892, when Keller's poem, The Frost King, came under scrutiny for plagiarism. OK, to avoid having your school get a bad rap, you expelled Helen Keller and the Miracle Worker. OK. At the time, Sullivan and Keller were becoming kind of famous, thanks to a newspaper article by Alexander Graham Bell. They were even invited to Washington DC for the opening of his Volta Bureau for Deaf Research in 1887. They returned the following May, and Bell accompanied them as they met President Grover Cleveland. Keller soon began to receive the majority of the attention, but both she and Sullivan both got to meet the legendary Samuel Clemens, better known as Mark Twain. It was Clemens who would later describe Sullivan as the miracle worker, which would eventually become the title of the famous play about Keller and Sullivan written by William Gibson. Sullivan was a dedicated teacher. She worked with Keller for years, even accompanying her to Radcliffe College in 1900. Sullivan attended all of Keller's classes, spelling to her during lectures and translating textbooks that were not in Braille. It was difficult for both of them and was especially exhausting for Sullivan, whose own vision began to suffer. But it paid off when Keller graduated with a bachelor's degree in 1904. After Keller's graduation, she and Sullivan moved to a farm in Rentham, Massachusetts, where Sullivan met John Albert Macy. She and Macy were married in 1905, and she continued to work with Keller despite her failing health. In 1914, Polly Thompson was hired as Keller's secretary. And after Sullivan's death in 1936, Thompson became Helen's companion. Thanks to the education provided by Anne Sullivan, Helen Keller never stopped learning. Keller's incredible life story led to worldwide fame, as well as a career as an author, poet, and public speaker. She became an advocate for blind and deaf individuals and for humanitarianism as a whole. In her autobiography, Keller attributed her love of learning and life to Sullivan. In Keller's own words, it was my teacher's genius which made the first years of my education so beautiful. How much of my delight in all beautiful things is innate, and how much is due to her influence, I can never tell. All the best of me belongs to her. So what do you think? Are you impressed by Anne Sullivan's success with Helen Keller? Let us know in the comments below. And while you're at it, check out some of these other videos from our Weird History.