With these ideas in mind there has been careful avoidance in this little book of any suggestion that the mother should be anxious about the speech development of the child before five years of age.  If she has the patience and the time to follow the directions given, she will have done her child a very great service; the greatest that lies within her power; and she will have laid the foundation for a more rapid and better development of speech than would have been possible without her preliminary training.

Not every mother will find it possible to carry out all the suggestions offered in this little book, but no one should feel discouraged on that account.  It seemed best to offer too many suggestions rather than too few, because these pages may fall into the hands of some mothers whose situation is such that full advantage can be taken of every idea here given.  Presence of too much matter in the little book will not destroy its usefulness in cases where only a portion can be applied, whereas the lack of some of the ideas might limit its value in certain instances.  No one should give up in despair just because it is not possible to do all that is here suggested.  Something, at least, can be found here which it is possible to do that will help very much.

Sometimes, through a false sense of shame, or through ignorance of the possibilities open to a deaf child, mothers have refused to admit that their children were deaf, or to allow anything to be done for them, until very valuable time has been lost.  This is unfair to the child, and very wrong.  A mother should have only pity for the deaf child and eagerness to aid him to overcome his handicap so far as possible.  Delay in frankly facing the facts and in taking all possible measures to develop the remaining faculties will in the end only increase the mother’s shame and add to it the pangs of remorse.

In a little book written to guide physicians in advising parents of deaf children, I said: 

“The situation of a deaf child differs very much, from an educational standpoint, from that of the little hearing child.  Two hours a day playing educational games in a kindergarten is as much as is usually given, or is needful, for the little hearing child up to six or seven years of age; and his mental development and success in after life will not be seriously endangered if even that is omitted and he does not begin to go to school until he is eight or nine.  The hearing child of eight who has never been in school and cannot read or write has, nevertheless, without conscious effort, mastered the two most important educational tasks in life.  He has learned to speak and has acquired the greater part of his working vocabulary.  In other words, although he has never been across the threshold of a school, his education is well advanced for his years and mental development.