有好一陣子我並沒有定期進程的正式課業；甚至於當我最認真學習的時候，也比較像是在做遊戲而不是做作業。蘇利文老師會用一個美麗的故事或者一首詩，來教我認識一件件事物。任何時候有什麼事情讓我高興或關心，她就會很像是我同齡小孩那樣和我一起談論。那些像是文法、困難的數學計算以及更難的定義等等艱辛的學習，許多孩子想起來就怕，對於我卻是日常最珍貴的回憶之一。 

蘇利文老師對於我的愉快滿足有特別的同情心，對於我的渴望願望有少見的共鳴，為何如此以及怎樣的程度，我很難說明。也許這是她長期和盲人交往的的結果，加上她有極好的描述事物的能力。她會快速省略乏味的細節，也從來不嘮叨問我是否記得前幾天的課業。枯燥的科學專門用語，在她一點一點的逐步講解，每個議論的對象那樣清楚實在，我很自然的就會牢牢記住。 

我們喜愛在戶外，在陽光洋溢的樹林中閱讀、朗誦和教學，甚於在屋子裡。我全部的早期學習中，因此，也在混合松脂香氣和野葡萄芬芳的樹林中，體驗了大自然。坐在野生鵝掌楸的雅致林蔭下，我學會去想像一切事物都能夠讓我學習和賦我啟發。萬事萬物的美好可愛，教導我它們的價值。真的喔，任何能嗡嗡響、唧唧叫、嗚嗚呼號或潺潺吟詠，或枝葉招展或花開，在我學習中都有作用。我曾經抓過放開嗓門吵鬧的蛙、大螽斯和蟋蟀，直到牠們尖銳的發出顫抖的聲音，才

發覺牠們的窘迫。長著絨毛的可愛小雞、野花、山茱萸、百合以及發育中的果樹….我探索爆裂的棉球，用手指觸摸它們柔軟的纖維和長有絨毛的種子；我感覺到穀物的莖桿間有低沉的風颯颯作響，而長有細毛的長葉摩擦出沙沙的聲音….還有當我我們在牧場上抓住我的小馬給牠套上嚼口馬勒時，牠發出的氣憤鼻息──啊，我還記得牠的呼吸中充滿馥郁的紅花草味。 

For a long time I had no regular lessons. Even when I studied most earnestly it seemed more like play than work. Everything Miss Sullivan taught me she illustrated by a beautiful story or a poem. Whenever anything delighted or interested me she talked it over with me just as if she were a little girl herself. What many children think of with dread, as a painful plodding through grammar, hard sums and harder definitions, is to-day one of my most precious memories.

I cannot explain the peculiar sympathy Miss Sullivan had with my pleasures and desires. Perhaps it was the result of long association with the blind. Added to this she had a wonderful faculty for description. She went quickly over uninteresting details, and never nagged me with questions to see if I remembered the day-before-yesterday's lesson. She introduced dry technicalities of science little by little, making every subject so real that I could not help remembering what she taught.

We read and studied out of doors, preferring the sunlit woods to the house. All my early lessons have in them the breath of the woods–the fine, resinous odour of pine needles, blended with the perfume of wild grapes. Seated in the gracious shade of a wild tulip tree, I learned to think that everything has a lesson and a suggestion. "The loveliness of things taught me all their use." Indeed, everything that could hum, or buzz, or sing, or bloom, had a part in my education–noisy- throated frogs, katydids and crickets held in my hand until, forgetting their embarrassment, they trilled their reedy note, little downy chickens and wild-flowers, the dogwood blossoms, meadow-violets and budding fruit trees. I felt the bursting cotton-bolls and fingered their soft fiber and fuzzy seeds; I felt the low soughing of the wind through the cornstalks, the silky rustling of the long leaves, and the indignant snort of my pony, as we caught him in the pasture and put the bit in his mouth–ah me! how well I remember the spicy, clovery smell of his breath!