Page 344 - The Story of My Lif

You must not imagine that as soon as Helen grasped the idea that everything had

a name she at once became mistress of the treasury of the English language, or
that “her mental faculties emerged, full armed, from their then living tomb, as
Pallas Athene from the head of Zeus,” as one of her enthusiastic admirers would
have us believe. At first, the words, phrases and sentences which she used in
expressing her thoughts were all reproductions of what we had used in
conversation with her, and which her memory had unconsciously retained. And
indeed, this is true of the language of all children. Their language is the memory
of the language they hear spoken in their homes. Countless repetition of the
conversation of daily life has impressed certain words and phrases upon their
memories, and when they come to talk themselves, memory supplies the words
they lisp. Likewise, the language of educated people is the memory of the
language of books.

Language grows out of life, out of its needs and experiences. At first my little
pupil’s mind was all but vacant. She had been living in a world she could not
realize. LANGUAGE and KNOWLEDGE

are indissolubly connected; they are interdependent. Good work in language
presupposes and depends on a real knowledge of things.

As soon as Helen grasped the idea that everything had a name, and that by
means of the manual alphabet these names could be transmitted from one to
another, I proceeded to awaken her further interest in the OBJECTS whose
names she learned to spell with such evident joy. I NEVER TAUGHT
LANGUAGE FOR THE PURPOSE OF

TEACHING IT; but invariably used language as a medium for the
communication of THOUGHT; thus the learning of language was
COINCIDENT with the acquisition of knowledge. In order to use language
intelligently, one must have something to talk ABOUT, and having something to
talk about is the result of having had experiences; no amount of language
training will enable our little children to use language with ease and fluency
unless they have something clearly in their minds which they wish to
communicate, or unless we succeed in awakening in them a desire to know what

is in the minds of others.