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48
"The number on roll at the end of December was 45. Only
nine children are from Walthamstow, and 36 are from other
districts.
"The totally deaf number 20 and the other 25 are either
partially deaf or with at least some, if little, residual hearing."
The following report by the Headmistress is of interest:—
"G. was a very difficult child to deal with when she first came
to this school in March 1953.
"Most children who are deafened as she was go through a
period of bewilderment and bitterness, but in most cases that period
is not long. They respond to love and understanding, and when
they can lip-read, as they can very soon, they become adjusted to
the new circumstances and make rapid progress.
"G. was with us for months before she showed even a spark
of interest in anything, and, far from responding to a casual gesture
of affection, she positively shrank from it, and angrily repulsed the
person offering it. She had been here for three months before 1
saw her smile. For long, in spite of almost superhuman patience
on the part of staff and children, she remained an unhappy little
'lone wolf,' and we felt that to force the pace would have been to
court failure and would do more harm than good.
"We eventually broke down this resistance to all attempts at
friendship by giving her charge of a baby girl who came with her
in the same school bus and what we had failed to do, L. achieved.
"G. became protective and gentle with the little girl, and one
by one we added to her brood. After a while she came diffidently
to us to tell us of their needs or little clevernesses and gradually
she became more and more co-operative, accepting other motherly
little girls as assistants, and even leaving the babies to their own
devices to play with her contemporaries at normal games.
"I discovered quite by accident that she has a passion for
animals, and I opened the flood gates one day by mentioning her pet
cat. It was a real joy to see the poor little tightly-shut-up child
opening out and forgetting to be unfriendly. Since that day her lipreading
has improved rapidly and her attitude to others has
changed.
"Her speech was inaudible when she first came, and her
written work illegible. Her voice is still not good—it is hoarse and
a little too quiet, but she is now amenable to correction, so it will go
on improving, and her written work is good.
"She still does have fits of moodiness, but they are few, and
her general school work is showing steady, if slow, progress. She
will never be 'the life and soul of the party,' but at least she has
accepted her disability, and is happy and uninhibited when with her