Hellen Keller

Helen Keller

Helen Keller can be seen as a remarkable role model for the entire human race. Her story is one that everyone has heard of and one that is taught to most children during their elementary school days. Her story is so influential and serves as a good example of achieving success when one tries hard enough.

The story of Helen Keller is the story of a child who, at the age of 18 months, was suddenly shut off from the world, but who, against overwhelming odds, waged a slow, hard, but successful battle to reenter that same world. The inarticulate, little, deaf and blind girl grew into a highly intelligent and sensitive woman who wrote, spoke, and labored incessantly for the betterment of others.

Keller's big breakthrough in communication came one day when she realized that the motions her teacher, Anne Sullivan, was making on her palm, while running cool water over her hand, symbolized the idea of "water." When she began to discover that there was a whole world out there, she nearly exhausted Sullivan by demanding the names of all the other familiar objects in her world.

Annie Sullivan taught Helen to speak using the Tadoma method of touching the lips and throat of others as they speak, combined with finger spelling letters on the palm of the child's hand. Later Keller learned Braille, and used it to read not only English but also French, German, Greek, and Latin. By her persistence, she went on to bring forth her intellectual and emotional abilities. Despite the social obstacles of her time, she became the first deaf/blind person to graduate from college. From then on, Helen