The Story of My Life - Chapter 4

The Story of My Life - Chapter 4

Reading Comprehension

Paragraph 1

• The most important day I remember in all my life is the one on which my teacher, Anne Mansfield Sullivan, came to me. I am filled with wonder when I consider the immeasurable contrasts between the two lives which it connects. It was the third of March, 1887, three months before I was seven years old.

Multiple Choice

The most important day I remember in all my life is the one on which my teacher, Anne Mansfield Sullivan, came to me. I am filled with wonder when I consider the immeasurable contrasts between the two lives which it connects. It was the third of March, 1887, three months before I was seven years old.

How old was Helen Keller when she first met Miss Sullivan?

• 5

• 6

• 7

• 8

Poll

Helen mentioned that there was "immeasurable contrasts" between two lives. Whose lives do you think those are?

• Helen's and Miss Sullivan's

• Helen before meeting Miss Sullivan and Helen after meeting Miss Sullivan.

• Helen's and the world

• Helen's and her mother's

Paragraph 2

• Prior to that day, for weeks, I had felt so much anger and bitterness. I was like a great ship at sea in a dense fog, tense and anxious, having no way of knowing how near the harbor was. "Light! give me light!" was the wordless cry of my soul.

Open Ended

Helen was comparing her feelings to that of a great ship lost at sea, tense and anxious, having no way of knowing where the harbor was.

Why do you think she felt tense and anxious?

Multiple Choice

I was like a great ship at sea in a dense fog, tense and anxious, having no way of knowing how near the harbor was.

Helen compared herself to a ship lost at sea. Which figurative language did she use?

• simile

• metaphor

Paragraph 3

• On the afternoon of that eventful day, I stood on the porch, dumb, expectant. I guessed from my mother's signs and from the hurrying to and fro in the house that something unusual was about to happen, so I went to the door and waited on the steps.

What is the "unusual thing" that was about to happen to Helen?

• On the afternoon of that eventful day, I stood on the porch, dumb, expectant. I guessed from my mother's signs and from the hurrying to and fro in the house that something unusual was about to happen, so I went to the door and waited on the steps.

Paragraph 4

• I felt approaching footsteps. I stretched out my hand as if to my mother. Some one took it, and I was caught up and held close in the arms of her who had come to reveal all things to me, and, more than all things else, to love me.

Poll

I felt approaching footsteps. I stretched out my hand as if to my mother. Some one took it, and I was caught up and held close in the arms of her who had come to reveal all things to me, and, more than all things else, to love me.

Do you think Helen trusted Miss Sullivan at the first meeting?

• Yes

• No

Prediction Question

If you have to teach a deaf and blind child the word "doll", how would you do it?

Paragraph 5

• The next morning, she gave me a doll. When I had played with it a little while, Miss Sullivan slowly spelled into my hand the word "d-o-l-l." I was immediately interested in this finger play and tried to imitate it. When I finally succeeded in making the letters correctly, I was filled with childish pleasure and pride. Running downstairs to my mother, I held up my hand and made the letters for doll.

Paragraph 5 (continuted)

I did not know that I was spelling a word or even that words existed; I was simply making my fingers go in monkey-like imitation. In the days that followed, I learned to spell in this uncomprehending way many words, among them pin, hat, cup and a few verbs like sit, stand and walk.

Multiple Choice

I did not know that I was spelling a word or even that words existed; I was simply making my fingers go in monkey-like imitation.

Did Helen understand that she was writing a word that means doll?

• Yes

• No

Open Ended

What are the other words that she learned to spell?

Prediction Question

Now you have to teach a deaf and blind child the word "water". How would you do it?

Paragraph 6

One day we had had a struggle over the words "m-u-g" and "w-a-t-e-r." Miss Sullivan had tried to teach me that "m-u-g" is mug and that "w-a-t-e-r" is water, but I kept confusing the two. In despair she had dropped the subject for the time, only to renew it at the first opportunity. I became impatient at her repeated attempts and, taking the new doll, I dashed it upon the floor.

Prediction Question

How do you think Helen felt after dashing the doll on the floor?

Paragraph 6 (cont.)

I was keenly delighted when I felt the fragments of the broken doll at my feet. Neither sorrow nor regret followed my passionate outburst. I had not loved the doll.

Poll

Do you think Helen was a naughty child?

• Yes

• No

Helen had a reason.

I was keenly delighted when I felt the fragments of the broken doll at my feet. Neither sorrow nor regret followed my passionate outburst. I had not loved the doll. In the still, dark world in which I lived there was no tenderness.

Paragraph 6 (cont.)

I felt my teacher sweep the fragments to one side of the room, and I had a sense of satisfaction. She brought me my hat, and I knew I was going out into the warm sunshine. This thought made me hop and skip with pleasure.

Open Ended

How do you think Miss Sullivan is feeling now?

Prediction Question

Why do you think Miss Sullivan let Helen go out? What do you think they would do?

Paragraph 7

We walked down the path to the well-house. Some one was drawing water and my teacher placed my hand under the spout. As the cool stream flowed over my one hand, she spelled into my other hand the word water. I stood still, paying my whole attention on the movements of her fingers. Suddenly, somehow the mystery of language was revealed to me. I knew then that "w-a-t-e-r" meant the wonderful cool something that was flowing over my hand.

Open Ended

How do you think Helen felt after learning the meaning of "water"?

Paragraph 7 (cont.)

I knew then that "w-a-t-e-r" meant the wonderful cool something that was flowing over my hand. That living word awakened my soul, gave it light, hope, joy, set it free! There were barriers still, it is true, but barriers that could in time be swept away.

Paragraph 8

I left the well-house eager to learn. Everything had a name, and each name gave birth to a new thought. As we returned to the house every object I touched seemed to quiver with life. That was because I saw everything with the strange, new realization that had come to me. On entering the door I remembered the doll I had broken. I felt my way to the hearth and picked up the pieces. I tried vainly to put them together. Then my eyes filled with tears; for I realized what I had done, and for the first time I felt regret and sorrow.

Paragraph 9

I learned a great many new words that day. I do not remember all of them; but I do know that mother, father, sister, teacher were among them. It would have been difficult to find a happier child than I was as I lay in my crib at the close of the eventful day and lived over the joys it had brought me, and for the first time longed for a new day to come.

Reflection Question

Did Helen feel differently at the end of Chapter 4 compared to at the beginning?