Page:EB1911 - Volume 07.djvu/915

Rh impossible to draw hard and fast lines between these means of instruction. One merges into another, and this other into the next; and no two teachers will, or can, adopt exactly the same lines. It is not desirable that they should, for much must be left to individuality. Orders, rules, methods, should not be absolute laws. Observe them generally, but dispense with them as circumstances, the pupil and opportunity may require. Strong individuality, sympathy, enthusiasm, long intercourse with the deaf, are needed in the teacher, and it is surely obvious that every teacher should have a full command of all the primary means of instruction to begin with, and not of one only.

Where deafness is absolute, or practically so, we have to seek for means that will appeal to the eye instead of the ear. Of these, we have the sign language, writing and printing, pictures, manual alphabets and lip-reading. We have to choose which of these is to be used, if not all, and which must be rejected, if any. Moreover, we have to decide how much or how little one or another is to be adopted if we employ more than one. Hence it is obvious that there may be many different systems and subdivisions of systems. But the two main methods are the manual, which generally depends upon all the above-mentioned means of appealing to the eye except lip-reading, and the oral, which adopts what the manual method rejects, uses writing and printing and perhaps pictures, but excludes finger-spelling and (theoretically) signs. To these two we must add a third means of instruction—the combined system—which rejects no means of teaching, but uses all in most cases. The dual method need hardly be called a separate method or system, for it implies simply the use of the manual method for some pupils and of the oral for others. Nor need we call the mother’s (= intuitive or natural) a separate method in the sense in which we are using the word here, for it is rather a mode of procedure which can be applied manually or orally indifferently. The same may be said of the grammatical “method”; also of the “word method,” which is really the “mother’s.” The “eclectic method” is practically the combined system, or something between that and the dual method, and hardly needs separate classification.

Let us notice the manual method, the oral method, and the combined system, considering with the last the “dual method.”

The chief elements of the manual method are finger-spelling, reading and writing and signing. These are used, that is to say, as means of teaching English and imparting ideas. Signs are used to awaken the child’s thoughts, finger-spelling and writing are used to express these thoughts in the vernacular. The latter are used to express English, the former to explain English.

We give two manual alphabets, the one-handed being used in America, on the continent of Europe with some variations and additions, in Ireland, and also to some extent in England; the two-handed in Great Britain, Ireland and Australia. A speed of 130 words a minute can be attained when spelling on the fingers. Words are quite readable at this speed.

Although reading and writing are common to both methods, the manual and oral, as a matter of fact they seem to be used considerably more in the former than in the latter.

In the oral method articulation and lip-reading are chiefly relied upon; reading and writing are also adopted. The phonetic values of the letters are taught, not the names of the letters; for instance, the sound of the letter ă in “hat” is taught instead of the name of the letter (long A), though of course the latter is taught where such is the proper pronunciation, as in “hate.”

Here is a chart which was lately in use:

Articulation Sheets.

Order in which the Vowel Sounds are to be taught.



The consonants are as follows, though the order of teaching them varies:—

p; f; s; h; sh; v = f; th (thin; moth); th (then; smooth); l; r; t; k; b; d; g (go; egg); z = s; m; n; ch = tsh; j = dzh = g; ph = f; kc = k; cs = s; q = kw; x = ks; ng; w = oo; wh = hw; y = e.