Anne Sullivan, 1866 - 1936
1887
Born: 14 April 1866, Feeding Hills, Massachusetts
Died: 20 October 1936, Queens, New York
Annie's parents were both cooks who had left Ireland because of the potato famine. At age five, she contracted trachoma, an infection of the eyes that causes loss of vision due to scarring. She had many surgeries on her eyes between then and 1887. In 1880 she entered the Perkins School for the Blind, leaving as valedictorian in 1886. The next year she took on the job of governess and tutor to Helen Keller, the job that occupied the rest of her life. She began teaching Helen words signed onto Helen's palm but the words meant little to a girl both blind and deaf. The breakthrough came when she spelled out "water" and then poured water over Helen's hand; the girl immediately demanded the names of everything around her and went on to become the first blind and deaf person to earn a Bachelor of Arts degree (Radcliffe) and a powerful communicator, a breakthrough that earned Sullivan the label Miracle Worker.
Biography from Wikipedia
Anne Sullivan quotes:
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- Children require guidance and sympathy far more than instruction. permalink
Anne Sullivan - I am beginning to suspect all elaborate and special systems of education. They seem to me to be built up on the supposition that every child is a kind of idiot who must be taught to think. permalink
Anne Sullivan - I have thought about it a great deal, and the more I think, the more certain I am that obedience is the gateway through which knowledge, yes, and love, too, enter the mind of the child. permalink
Anne Sullivan - I think that there are some teachers that do a very good job of incorporating culture and history. And there are some teachers who could use a little more help in that area. permalink
Anne Sullivan - If my parents didn't push me and didn't support education, I probably wouldn't be here today.... Regardless of whatever they went through and how they may have been treated, they felt education was important. So, it's easier when you have the parents who support it, rather than those who don't. permalink
Anne Sullivan - It's a great mistake, I think, to put children off with falsehoods and nonsense, when their growing powers of observation and discrimination excite in them a desire to know about things. permalink
Anne Sullivan - It's queer how ready people always are with advice in any real or imaginary emergency, and no matter how many times experience has shown them to be wrong, they continue to set forth their opinions, as if they had received them from the Almighty! permalink
Anne Sullivan - Keep on beginning and failing. Each time you fail, start all over again, and you will grow stronger until have accomplished a purpose - not the one you began with perhaps, but one you'll be glad to remember. permalink
Anne Sullivan - Love is something like the clouds that were in the sky, before the sun came out. You cannot touch the clouds, you know; but you feel the rain and know how glad the flowers and the thirsty earth are to have it after a hot day. You cannot touch love either. permalink
Anne Sullivan - My heart is singing for joy this morning! A miracle has happened! The light of understanding has shone upon my little pupil's mind, and behold, all things are changed! permalink
Anne Sullivan - People seldom see the halting and painful steps by which the most insignificant success is achieved. permalink
Anne Sullivan - The truth is not wonderful enough to suit the newspapers; so they enlarge upon it, and invent ridiculous embellishments. permalink
Anne Sullivan - Too often, I think, children are required to write before they have anything to say. Teach them to think and read and talk without self-repression, and they will write because they cannot help it. permalink
Anne Sullivan - We all like stories that make us cry. It's so nice to feel sad when you've nothing in particular to feel sad about. permalink
Anne Sullivan
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