Maria Montessori (1870-1952: Italy/the Netherlands)
Maria Montessori is best known for the “Montessori Method” of teaching young children, which she introduced and developed in Italy early in the 20th century. Her method, emphasizing independent learning and presenting children with simple materials that stimulated their thought processes, has been widely influential throughout the world.
Educated at University of Rome, Montessori was the first woman in Italy to qualify as a physician. She began her career teaching mentally disabled children as an assistant doctor at the psychiatric clinic of that university. Her specialized teaching of these students proved quite successful, and in 1907 she opened a pre-school for children from the San Lorenzo slum district of Rome. Further success with children there led to the establishment of Montessori schools, and Montessori began to lecture widely throughout Europe and the United States on teacher training.
Montessori’s method taught children initially through the senses, by encouraging them to spontaneously and independently use specially designed objects. The teacher remained in the background, allowing children to educate themselves, but guiding them to avoid wasted efforts or bad habits. The concrete materials help the child to change physically, developing such abilities as left-to-right reading movements that then enabled mental development. The method, Montessori’s supporters argued, taught children to read and write more quickly than using traditional repetitive learning.
Montessori held a chair of anthropology at the University of Rome from 1904-1908. In 1922 she was appointed government inspector for schools in Italy. She left Italy in 1934 with the rise of Fascism, eventually emigrating to the Netherlands. Included among her writings are The Montessori Method (1912) and Advanced Montessori Method (1917).
The Montessori Method, Chapter One, Maria Montessori
Translated by Anne Everett George. New York: Frederick A. Stokes Company, 1912. pp. 1-27.
Maria Montessori: a biography, Rita Kramer
Foreword by Anna Freud; Afterword by Rita Kramer
© 1988, 1976 by Rita Kramer; ISBN: 0-201-09227-1
Illustrations from The Montessori Method
New York: Frederick A. Stokes Company, 1912
- Dr. Montessori giving a lesson in touching geometrical insets
- Children touching letters and making words with cardboard script
- Didactic apparatus for training the sense of touch and for teaching writing
- School at Tarrytown, N. Y.
Maria Montessori
Photo: Retrieved May 18, 2006, from unitedstreaming
Fred Rogers and Jonathan Kozol
Photo: © 2000 by Family Communications, Inc.
Fred Rogers (on right) and his friend, colleague, and well-known author, Jonathan Kozol, featured in a keynote conversation about the importance of learning and creativity for young children, inspiring teachers to continue Maria Montessori's great tradition of appreciating children and childhood. 40th Annual Conference of the American Montessori Association
