27th June Helen Keller Day

Helen Keller was an American deaf-blind activist, a well-known writer, and a lecturer who advocated for laws to protect and help people with disabilities. 

We celebrate Helen Keller Day as part of Deaf-Blind Awareness Week (the last week in June). The 27th June was Helen Keller's birthday.

Helen Keller was born in Alabama in 1880 and lost her hearing and sight due to a disease before the age of two. At seven, her parents sought help from the Perkins School for The Blind. Anne Sullivan was asked to work with Helen. She was also visually impaired and became nearly as famous as Helen. 

Sullivan used “touch teaching” techniques and her skilled guidance calmed the seemingly uncontrollable Keller. Keller learned how to read and write in Braille thanks to Sullivan’s own experiences that gave her a deeper understanding of her student’s struggles. Keller also used hand signals of the deaf-mute, which she understood by touch. 

The school library has these biographies, but there are many others:

 

19th -25th September International Week of Deaf People

 

Theme for 2022:
Building Inclusive Communities for All

It has been estimated that 466 million people in the world suffer from hearing issues or deafness! So it is likely you know someone or of someone who is deaf.

Deaf people in our world are beginning to be much more visible for school students which is a wonderful thing. At school we have two deaf students, one of whom has a cochlear implant. They are super keen to fit in and I have made sure that they see themselves represented in books in the library. Story Box Library an online Australian book website which we subscribe to, has books read in Auslan. The news and community announcements on television are signed and often a class will add signing to a song in assembly. Probably not enough, but far better than it used to be.

There are some wonderful picture books to introduce 'deafness' to children. I have written about some before. See here, but there are newer ones.

• Freddie and the Fairy by Julia Donaldson. This book is about lip reading and Julia Donaldson wrote it because she is hard of hearing and wanted to see a story with a deaf character.

Can Bears Ski? by Richard Antrobus and Polly Dunbar

Boy Bear cannot hear Dad Bear coming to wake him up in the morning but he can feel the floor vibrate with his heavy footsteps. He can only grasp little bits of what his teacher says to him at school. He cannot catch what his friends are laughing at. And, all the time, Boy Bear keeps hearing the question, "Can Bears ski?" What does it mean? Richard Antrobus is telling his own story of being young and deaf.

El Deafo by Cece Bell

El Deafo is a funny, deeply honest graphic novel memoir for middle graders. It chronicles the author's hearing loss at a young age and her subsequent experiences with a powerful and very awkward hearing aid called the Phonic Ear. It gives her the ability to hear--sometimes things she shouldn't--but also isolates her from her classmates. 

The Boy in the Jam Jar by Joyce Dunbar and John Shelley

A powerful and personal story from Joyce Dunbar about what it's like to experience hearing difficulties.

Boy  by Phil Cummings and Shane deVries

The boy in this story lives in a silent world because he is deaf, but he feels his community's fear of a dragon.

There are quite a few picture book biographies about deaf people who were leaders.

See all those about Helen Keller.

See those about Annie Sullivan

The biography of  world-famous deaf percussionist Dame Evelyn Glennie.

A biography about deaf baseball player William Hoy

Based on the true story of Chinese dancer Lihua Tai, The Visible Sounds tells the uplifting tale of a young child dealing with the frustration and solitude of hearing loss. Alone in silence, the child's life is changed forever when a chance touch unlocks a vibrant new world, now blazing with rainbows.

And of course there's also Edison and Beethoven.

January Braille Literacy Awareness Month

January is Braille Literacy Awareness Month. It is designated as such in honour of  Louis Braille who originally developed the Braille code that enables blind people to read.  Louis Braille was born on January 4, 1809. 

Literacy plays such a big role in both my private and working life that I would be devastated to lose the ability to read or write. To be born blind and not be able to read is something I only get to contemplate through reading. It has fascinated me though as a topic for picture books and I have shared many wonderful books with the young children I teach.  My Year 2 students are fascinated by the story of Annie Sullivan and Helen Keller and these two books, Helen's Big World  by Doreen Rappaport and Annie and Helen  by Deborah Hopkinson are borrowed often. Because of this I purchased Six Dots, the picture book about Braille by Jen Bryant and it too has been popular. Up until this beautiful book was published anything my students gleaned about Braille came from some crusty old readers or from the internet. We do however have a couple of books which feature Braille.
Look for:
• The Black Book of Colours  by Menena Cottin
This book has remarkable illustrations done with raised lines. Braille letters accompany the illustrations and a full Braille alphabet offers sighted readers help reading along with their fingers.

• Private and Confidential by Marion Ripley
Here Laura learns Braille so that she can send her blind penpal a letter.

14th April Annie Sullivan (1866 - 1936)

                           








Annie Sullivan is best known as the teacher of the blind girl Helen Keller. In fact books written about her, often refer to her as 'The Miracle Worker'. She had her own challenges in life too, including loosing her sight which was later restored as the result of operations, but after studying for herself she became the very persistent, but patient talented teacher and confidante of Helen. There have always been 'readers' about Anne and Helen, but recently two beautiful picture books have done much more justice to their lives, their successes and struggles. The first,  Helen's Big World: The Life of Helen Keller by Doreen Rappaport and Matt Travares provides a very accessible introduction for young readers to learn about these two women whose lives have become inspirational to others. The second,  Annie and Helen by Deborah Hopkinson and Raul Colon also provides an insight into their relationship, but also includes excerpts from letters written by Annie about her work with Helen and therefore seems to highlight Annie's achievements more.  Biographies such as these add status to the topic when compared to 'readers' that pare the facts down to a minimum and control the vocabulary to fit a certain level. For older children in primary school there is also an impressive photobiography from  National Geographic book, Helen's Eyes: A Photobiography of Annie Sullivan, Helen Keller's Teacher by Marfe Ferguson Delano.