Biography of Olga Skorokhodova. Olga Skorokhodova: Feelings of living space

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It is known that Olga Ivanovna was born in the village of Belozerka near Kherson. She was the only daughter in a poor peasant family. His mother worked as a laborer in the family of a priest, and his father was drafted into the army at the beginning of the Second World War, from where he did not return to the family.

There is some confusion with the dates of her birth, which, perhaps, would not have been worth paying attention to if it were not about the age at which the child lost his hearing and vision. In all works and O.I. Skorokhodova, and her teacher I.A. Sokolyansky it is written that she was born on July 24, 1914, at the age of five she fell ill with meningitis, after which she completely lost her sight and hearing in her left ear, hearing with right side decreased gradually.

As Olga Ivanovna herself wrote, the disease for a long time reminded of itself with frequent and severe headaches, memory impairment, high fatigue, and fears. Olga Ivanovna's mother died in the spring of 1922 from tuberculosis, her father lived elsewhere and did not make himself known, and all normal contacts with relatives were very complicated due to the girl's deaf-blindness and resumed much later. Olga Skorokhodova herself was distinguished by her very short, even small stature and graceful physique, so she always looked younger than her years.

After her death, the original documents were found - extracts from the church book - and the year of her birth was specified. It became known that she was born in 1911, and if she fell ill in 1919, then she was 8 years old when she completely lost her sight and began to gradually lose her hearing. Until about 11–13 years old, she heard loud speech in her right ear, but by the age of 14 she became completely deaf.

This is how Olga Ivanovna herself later described her condition after her illness: “However, despite this vague understanding of the state in which I was, I also vaguely continued to hope for that “beautiful moment” in which I would see and hear everything again ... ".

“...Because I didn’t feel people next to me, didn’t look at what was around me, it seemed to me that people and all objects were far away from me - much further than it actually happened ...”.

“... my loneliness contributed to the development of a very unbridled fantasy ... ... when I didn’t see my mother for a long time, I thought that some transformations could happen to her, because something happened to me that deprived me of sight and hearing ... It began to seem to me that the mother's legs suddenly disappeared, and wings grew instead of arms. She flies over our house, but cannot come to me…”.

“When I realized that I was “not like that”, that is, I realized that I was blind and almost deaf, I had a vague idea of some kind of, as I can now determine, a huge monster. And it is not visible to anyone, not heard by anyone, not tangible, nevertheless relentlessly followed me everywhere.

It seemed to me (especially when I was alone) that I always "feel" the breath of this "monster" and therefore knew about its "presence". And even in a dream, I "saw" it quite often: it looked like a huge - more horse - hedgehog, with short thick legs, with the same shape as a hedgehog's head, only big; but it was covered not with prickly needles, but with thick coarse wool. And it seemed to me that it was this “monster” from somewhere that brought me the disease, and then took away my sight and hearing ... ”.

“When I was left alone, my mother left, that terrible “monster” that pursued me at the beginning of my blindness has now become even more terrible, even larger in my imagination. In that desperate state in which I was in the absence of my mother, my excessively played out imagination painted a terrible picture for me: the “monster” crawled into the hut through the attic and quietly, slowly moved towards me ... From indescribable fear, I was covered with perspiration, and on my head and back "goosebumps ran ...".

After the death of her mother, she lived for some time in the families of relatives, and, finally, one of them took her to the School for the Blind in Odessa. Those were hungry years right after graduation civil war and the school helped the girl survive. She was even sent for treatment to a sanatorium, from where she fled back to school, since no one talked to her at all in the sanatorium. No one knew how to work with a deaf-blind girl individually at the school for the blind, and it was useless to be present in the class, since she did not hear at all what the teacher was saying. As Olga Ivanovna later recalled, the school for the blind was constantly transferred from one room to another, there were not enough technical staff and the blind children tried to do everything themselves.

Together with the final loss of hearing, vestibular disorders also appeared, it became difficult for Olga to walk, she often felt dizzy. The people around her continued to speak loudly in her ear, and she only felt their breath, not hearing any sounds. The girl was reported to Kharkov to Professor Ivan Afanasyevich Sokolyansky, and at the beginning of 1925 she was brought to the School-Clinic for the Deaf-Blind, which he had just organized in this city at the School for the Blind. After the girl got used to the new environment and got used to the good organized life V new school, I.A. Sokolyansky set about restoring Olga's oral speech, which was impaired after hearing loss.

According to the memoirs of Olga Ivanovna, “everything in this institution was so comfortable, so consistent in material and domestic attitude to its intended purpose, that it was hardly possible to wish for the best, especially since there were not so many pupils - from five to nine people. Each pupil had his own separate place for all occasions, so as not to interfere with each other during classes with a teacher, during independent games. At the same time, there was also a common room for joint games, gymnastic exercises and other entertainment. The clinic had a special landscaped garden where deaf-blind-mute children could walk alone or in a group. The garden had enclosed flower beds, lawns, paths, and a playground for group games. In summer, hammocks were hung in the garden, wooden swings, boats, tables for board games. The guys rode children's tricycles along long straight paths ”(Adaptation of a deaf-blind-mute to life / / Special School, 1963, N 1, p. 59).

I.A. Sokolyansky, having begun work on teaching Olga Skorokhodova at the Kharkov school, set himself the task of obtaining self-observation of the deaf-blind students themselves as early as possible, at least in the most primitive form, to teach them to talk about themselves and their experiences. To do this, without waiting for the girl to fully master the technique of writing, they began to work on a daily description of the events of her Everyday life. The ability to record and the ability to observe developed in Olga in parallel. She systematically returned to the notes of her observations and, leaving the fact intact, changed the literary edition of his description as her written language developed. Many facts surfaced from memory and were recorded again. Not a single fact was told to her from outside. She conducted all the observations independently and only showed the teachers in written form, but only for familiarization, and not for correction. Her manuscript was never subjected to any editorial changes during publication, either during Sokolyansky's lifetime or after his death. After 17 years of such work on the diaries, material appeared for the first book by Olga Skorokhodova.

Here is how Olga Ivanovna herself wrote about it:

“At first, only those who worked with me could read these notes. But as I got the hang of spoken language, my notes became clearer and clearer ... When these records grew, the question arose of their literary design, and then of publication.

“... many of the recorded facts I re-formatted 10-20 times. After all, it is one thing to feel, perceive, “examine” an object with your hands, it is not so difficult, it is much more difficult to describe this object in your own words exactly as I perceive it, i.e. give an image of this object.

“Year after year my records expanded, my literary language. The reader may believe me or not believe me - this is his will - but knowledge and literary speech I owe it to reading books and above all, fiction. The salvation of the blind, the deaf-mute, and especially the deaf-deaf-mute is in reading. It was for Olga Skorokhodova that I.A. Sokolyansky worked on the invention of the Reading Machine, unique for that time, which was supposed to make it possible for the blind to read ordinary font.

As the oldest pupil in the school for the deaf and blind, Olga actively participated and even supervised some of the games and activities of the younger children. Her special concern was the little deaf-blind girl Maria Sokol, who entered the school in 1935.

According to an individual program, Olga Ivanovna graduated from a secondary school in Kharkov and was preparing to enter the university. During these years, she begins to correspond with the famous Russian writer Maxim Gorky. But all the rainbow plans were prevented by the Great Patriotic War and the occupation of the whole Ukraine by the Germans until 1944. All this time, Olga Ivanovna lived in Kharkov in a school for the blind and with her teachers. Immediately after the liberation of Kharkov, the parents of Maria Sokol found her there, with a request to continue the education of her deaf-blind daughter, who war time stayed with her parents in the village. Maria lived with Olga Ivanovna for several months for the purpose of studying, and they managed to begin the restoration of reading and writing in Braille, which had been forgotten by that time. But already in 1944, Olga Ivanovna moved to Moscow, where her teacher I.A. was already working. Sokolyansky (1889-1960) and began to continue to study and work at the Institute of Defectology.

In 1947, her first book, How I Perceive the world". The preface to this edition was written by the famous psychologist A.N. Leontiev, where he drew Special attention to the amazing subtlety of the descriptions by the author various kinds her sensitivity - touch, smell, vibrational sense, temperature and taste sensations, which replaced her hearing and sight. He found Olga Ivanovna's self-observations of particular interest, characterizing integral, complex experiences of the environment, which were supplemented by an analysis not only of his own sensations, but also by the desire to understand the impressions of others, seeing and hearing people. Self-observation O.I. Skorokhodova was clearly shown how the knowledge that a person masters is able to push the boundaries of the world he experiences. A.N. Leontiev also noted that in this book one can see the extraordinary personality of the author, who reveals to the reader the process spiritual development deaf-blind person, whose self-observations are of particular importance for psychology.

In 1954, this book was supplemented by the second part and was published under the title "How I perceive and represent the world around me." This book was republished with minor changes in 1956. In the preface to it, I.A. Sokolyansky described a long-term system of working with Olga to teach her to observe and record these observations.

A new supplemented version of this book “How I perceive, imagine and understand the world around me” was published in 1972 with a foreword by the head of the laboratory for the education and upbringing of deaf-blind children of the Research Institute of Defectology of the Academy of Pedagogical Sciences of the USSR, where Olga Ivanovna worked, Doctor of Psychology A.I. Meshcheryakov (1923–1974), in which he describes in detail the biography of the teacher Olga Ivanovna, I.A. Sokolyansky, and sets out his understanding of the system of education for the deaf-blind, most attention devoting the initial period of their training. At the end of this text, Alexander Ivanovich returns to the characterization of the author of the book and writes: “Great, of course, is the merit of the teacher O.I. Skorokhodova Ivan Afanasyevich Sokolyansky, but the greatness of his merit in no way detracts from the feat of O.I. Skorokhodova. She works, she, along with all other employees, writes scientific papers, reports on them ... And we somehow forget that Olga Ivanovna's whole life is a feat. A feat that she accomplishes every day for many years."

In the preface to the 1990 edition, written by candidate psychological sciences V.N. Chulkov (1939–1997), under whose leadership Olga Ivanovna worked in last years life, we find evidence of her difficult personal experiences, overcoming disbelief in herself. There is also a mention here of her complex, constantly changing relationship with her teacher throughout her life. “By nature, she was a lively, openly proud and non-rational person. Naive calculation was combined with intuition, female hope, weakness and caprice lived next to childish reckless egoism. Victories, small and large, were not easy for her, and the bitter taste of defeat was also well known to her ... ".

Few people know that Olga Ivanovna long years worked on her second book, My Observations on the Deaf, Blind, and Mute, which remained unpublished. In this book, she describes in detail the deaf-blind children who are brought up with her in the Kharkov school-clinic, pupils orphanage in Zagorsk (now Sergiev Posad) and his communication with the now famous four deaf-blind graduates of the psychological faculty of Moscow State University.

Olga Skorokhodova had a Ph.D. in Pedagogical Sciences and worked for the rest of her life researcher in the Laboratory for the Education and Education of the Deafblind at the Institute of Defectology in Moscow, was the author of many scientific and popular science articles, poems. She often gave lectures to students of many universities in her country. For many years she lived alone, in everyday life and work she was constantly helped by two visiting secretaries and from time to time employees of the laboratory where she worked. When her health deteriorated, her niece, N.V., moved in with her. Skorokhodova, who looked after her until her death, which occurred in 1982.

Everything written by Olga Ivanovna helps us understand the amazing inner world a person who lost his sight and hearing, but retained great interest and joy in life.

Others think - those who hear the sounds,
Those who see the sun, stars and moon:
How can she describe beauty without sight?
How will he understand the sounds and spring without hearing!?

I will hear the smell and dew coolness,
I catch the light rustle of leaves with my fingers.
Drowning in the dusk, I will walk through the garden,
And I'm ready to dream, and I love to say ...

Let me not see the eyes of his radiance,
I will not hear a voice, gentle, lively,
But words without sound - feelings fluttering -
I catch and hear with a quick hand.

And for the mind, for the heart, I'm ready to love,
As they love the smell of a delicate flower,
Just as they love an expensive word in friendship,
Just like a clenched hand loves to tremble.

I see with my mind, I hear with my feelings,
And I will clothe the free world with a dream ...
Will each of the sighted describe beauty,
Will it smile clearly at the bright beam?

I have no hearing, I have no sight,
But I have more - feelings of living space:
Flexible and obedient, burning inspiration
I wove a colorful pattern of life.

If you are enchanted by beauty and sounds,
Do not be proud of this happiness before me!
Better stretch with good feeling hand,
So that I was with you, and not behind the wall.

Cand. psychol. Sciences, T.A. Basilova

Olga Skorokhodova was born on May 24, 1911 in Ukraine, in the village of Belozerka near Kherson, into a family of poor peasants. Her father was mobilized in 1914 and did not return from the war, and her mother was a farm worker for a priest. At the age of five, due to meningitis, the girl completely lost her sight and began to gradually lose her hearing. Until about the age of 11, she heard loud speech in her right ear, but by the age of 14 she became completely deaf.

After the death of her mother, the girl lived with relatives for some time. Over time, they placed her in a school for the blind in Odessa. However, there no one began to study with her individually, since Olga did not hear at all what the teacher was saying. People around her tried to speak loudly in her ear, but she only felt the breath, not the sounds.
In 1925, Olya entered a school-clinic for deaf-blind-mute children in Kharkov, which was founded by Professor Ivan Sokolyansky. Under his supervision, the girl recovered oral speech, she began to keep records of self-observation day by day, thus developing the ability to observe and record. She made her observations completely independently and only showed them to the teacher in the already recorded form.

After graduating high school By special program She decided to continue her studies. Olya dreamed of entering the Leningrad Pedagogical Institute, but the plans were not destined to come true, since the war began. During the occupation, she lived in Kharkov in a school for the blind and at the home of her teachers.
After the liberation of Kharkov in 1944, she moved to Moscow. After meeting with her teacher Ivan Sokolyansky, who worked at the Scientific and Practical Institute of Special Schools as a senior researcher, she was enrolled in the Institute of Defectology.

In 1947, her first book, entitled “How I Perceive the World Around,” was published, in which Skorokhodova told how the knowledge that a person masters can push the boundaries of what is experienced. After the publication of the book, Olga Ivanovna was enrolled as a junior researcher in the laboratory for the study and education of the deaf-blind-mute.

In 1954, the book was supplemented by the second part and published under the title "How I perceive and represent the world around me." A new, revised version of this book, How I Perceive, Imagine, and Understand the World Around Me, was published in 1972.
After the success of her book, Skorokhodova began working on the book My Observations on the Deaf-Blind and Mute, in which she described in detail the deaf-blind children who were brought up with her in the Kharkov school-clinic.
Olga Skorokhodova had a PhD in Pedagogy, until the end of her life she worked as a researcher at the Laboratory for the Education and Education of the Deafblind at the Institute of Defectology in Moscow, and was the author of many scientific and popular science articles and poems. She often gave lectures to students of many pedagogical universities in Moscow and other cities.

In 1948, Skorokhodova became a researcher (later a senior researcher) at the Research Institute of Defectology of the Academy of Pedagogical Sciences of the USSR, where she worked until the end of her life.

Olga Skorokhodova died in 1982.

Others think
(Olga Skorokhodova)

Others think - those who hear the sounds,
Those who see the sun, stars and moon:
How can she describe beauty without sight?
How will he understand the sounds and spring without hearing?!
I will hear the smells of dew, coolness,
I catch the slight rustle of leaves with my fingers.
Drowning in the dusk, I will walk through the garden,
And I'm ready to dream, and say: I love ...
Let me not see the eyes of his radiance,
I will not hear a voice, gentle, lively,
But words without sound - feelings flutter -
I catch and hear with a quick hand.
And for the mind, for the heart, I'm ready to love,
Just like the smell of a delicate flower.
Just as they love an expensive word in friendship,
Just like a clenched hand loves to tremble.
I see with my mind, I hear with my feelings,
And I will clothe the free world with a dream ...
Will each of the sighted describe beauty,
Will he smile clearly at the bright beam?
I have no hearing, I have no sight,
But I have more - feelings of living space:
Flexible and obedient, burning inspiration
I wove a colorful pattern of life.
If you are enchanted by beauty and sounds, -
Do not be proud of this happiness before me!
Better stretch out your hand with kindness,
So that I was with you, and not behind the wall.

Deaf-blind writer and defectologist Olga Skorokhodova.
24/05/2016
- http://www.aif.ru/dontknows/file/clepogluhaya_pisatelnica_i_uchenyy-defektolog_olga_skorohodova_spravka -

On May 24, 1911, Olga Skorokhodova was born - the only deaf-blind researcher in the world. In the complete absence of sight and hearing, she created several world-famous scientific works affecting the problem of development, upbringing and education of deaf-blind-mute children. Dealing with this issue, she managed to describe the features of perception and imagination of a deaf-blind person.

Biography

Olga Skorokhodova was born on May 24, 1911 in Ukraine in the village of Belozerka near Kherson in a family of poor peasants. Her father was mobilized in 1914 and did not return from the war, and her mother was a farm worker for a priest. At the age of five, due to meningitis, the girl completely lost her sight and began to gradually lose her hearing. Until about the age of 11, she heard loud speech in her right ear, but by the age of 14 she became completely deaf.

After the death of her mother, the girl lived with relatives for some time. Over time, they placed her in the School of the Blind in Odessa. However, there no one began to study with her individually, since Olga did not hear at all what the teacher was saying. People around her tried to speak loudly in her ear, but she only felt the breath, not the sounds.

In 1925, Olya entered a school-clinic for deaf-blind-mute children in Kharkov, which was founded by Professor Ivan Sokolyansky. Under his supervision, the girl recovered her oral speech, she began to take notes on self-observation from day to day, thus developing the ability to observe and write down. She made her observations completely independently and only showed them to the teacher in the already recorded form.

After graduating from high school with a special program, she decided to continue her studies. Olya dreamed of entering the Leningrad Pedagogical Institute, but the plans were not destined to come true, since the war began. During the occupation, she lived in Kharkov in a school for the blind and at the home of her teachers.

After the liberation of Kharkov in 1944, she moved to Moscow. After meeting with her teacher Ivan Sokolyansky, who worked at the Scientific and Practical Institute of Special Schools as a senior researcher, she was enrolled in the Institute of Defectology.

In 1947, her first book, entitled “How I Perceive the World Around,” was published, in which Skorokhodova described how the knowledge that a person masters can push the boundaries of what is experienced. After the publication of the book in circulation, Olga Ivanovna was enrolled as a junior researcher in the laboratory for the study and education of deaf-blind-mutes.

After the success of her book, Skorokhodova began working on the book My Observations on the Deaf-Blind and Mute, in which she described in detail the deaf-blind children who were brought up with her in the Kharkov school-clinic.

Olga Skorokhodova had a PhD in Pedagogy, until the end of her life she worked as a researcher at the Laboratory for the Education and Education of the Deafblind at the Institute of Defectology in Moscow, and was the author of many scientific and popular science articles and poems. She often gave lectures to students of many pedagogical universities in Moscow and other cities.

Others think
(Olga Skorokhodova)

Others think - those who hear the sounds,
Those who see the sun, stars and moon:
How can she describe beauty without sight?
How will he understand the sounds and spring without hearing!?
I will hear the smell of dew cool,
I catch the light rustle of leaves with my fingers ..
Drowning in the dusk, I will walk through the garden,
And I'm ready to dream, and say: I love ...
Let me not see the eyes of his radiance,
I will not hear a voice, gentle, lively,
But words without sound - feelings flutter -
I catch and hear with a quick hand.
And for the mind, for the heart, I'm ready to love,
Just like the smell of a delicate flower.
Just as they love an expensive word in friendship,
Just like a clenched hand loves to tremble.
I see with my mind, I hear with my feelings,
And I will clothe the free world with a dream ...
Will each of the sighted describe beauty,
Will it smile clearly at the bright beam?
I have no hearing, I have no sight,
But I have more - feelings of living space:
Flexible and obedient, burning inspiration
I wove a colorful pattern of life.
If you are enchanted by beauty and sounds, -
Do not be proud of this happiness before me!
Better stretch out your hand with kindness,
So that I was with you, and not behind the wall.