Seeing with the Ears
Check Your Understanding
A Read the following sentences. Check (✓) true (T) or false (F).
1. Ben was never able to see.
2. Dolphins and bats make clicking sounds to know where to go.
3. Doctors found that Ben had average hearing ability.
4. Ben tried hard, but he was unable to ride a bike.
5. A human brain can learn to analyze an echo.
B Complete the following paragraph using words or phrases from the passage.
6. The human body really is amazing. (1) ______ was a teenager who showed us how people with (2) ______ can (3) ______ them.
7. He went blind at a young age after getting (4) ______, yet he found a way to "see" his surroundings by making (5) ______.
8. This is a skill called (6) ______, which is also used by dolphins and bats.
9. Doctors once believed blind people developed (7) ______ to get around, which was proven to be untrue.
10. Now they have learned using (8) ______ that the part of the brain that controls (9) ______ is stimulated when a blind person hears echoes.
11. For Ben, learning to "see" took a long time, but it enabled him to cycle and (10) ______ around his neighborhood.
Critical Thinking
C Discuss the following questions with a partner.
- What is the author's opinion about Ben Underwood? Give examples from the passage to support your answer.
- How would learning how to use echolocation benefit a person who can see?
Sample Answers
1. The author clearly admires Ben Underwood. The passage calls him "a great example" and says he "remains a shining example of what people are capable of if they are determined enough."
2. Learning echolocation could help sighted people navigate in dark places or when visibility is poor, such as in fog or smoke.
Seeing with the Ears
The human body is an amazing thing. People
can train themselves to achieve unbelievable
feats, from setting Olympic records to finding
ways to overcome. physical disabilities1 Ben
Underwood is a great example of someone
who trained his body to do something
incredible.
At the age of three, Ben went blind from retinal cancer, a type of eye cancer. When Ben was about five years old, his mother noticed him making a clicking sound with his tongue that seemed to help him understand his surroundings. This skill, known as echolocation, is normally used by animals with very sensitive hearing, like dolphins and bats, for communication and to find food. They make sounds and listen for the echo made when the sound waves hit an object and bounce back. Doctors tested Ben's hearing ability, but found it was normal. If Ben did not have superior hearing, how was he able to use echolocation?
Doctors used to believe blind people developed a sharper sense of hearing to help them overcome their loss of sight. Doctors did tests to try to confirm this, but just like in Ben's case, the research showed that the test subjects generally had normal human hearing. It was through brain scans that doctors began to understand the phenomenon of echolocation. The scans show that when a blind person hears an echo, the parts of the brain that are related to vision are stimulated.
So even though blind people can't see with their eyes, their brains are able to determine the shape and size of nearby objects. They move around an object, clicking and listening, to better understand its shape. This refines the picture of the object in their minds. In this way, blind people come to "see" their environment.
By the time he was a teenager, Ben Underwood could safely ride a bike and skateboard around his neighborhood using echolocation. Of course, it took Ben years of training his mind and his senses to overcome his lack of sight. Sadly, Ben passed away in 2009 at the age of 16, but he remains a shining example of what people are capable of if they are determined enough.
1 A disability is a permanent injury or illness that affects the way someone can live their life.
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