Education and the Deaf-Blind Child

Abstract

To summarize, the education of deaf-blind children has made progress through the past 130 years because of the inspiration of the famous early teachers, Dr. Howe and Anne Sullivan, and their pupils, Laura Bridgman and Helen Keller, and the part they played in changing the educational philosophy for handicapped children, i.e. from one of pessimism to a more optimistic one. Medical advances have to some extent altered the handicapped population and are thus offering the educators of these children many new challenges involving educational evaluations and methods and systems of teaching. At the present time seven schools or departments for deaf-blind children are serving deaf-blind children to the very best of their abilities with specially designed preschool and elementary educational programs. Their goal is the building of a foundation for these children upon which a realistically independent and social future, commensurate with each child's interests and potentials, may be based.