EL IMPULSO DEL NIÑO HACIA EL TRABAJO- 1939

La siguiente lectura fue dada por la Dra. Maria Montessori en la inauguración del XXIV
Curso Internacional en Londres, en 1939. Lo que sigue es exactamente lo que pronuncio
en su discurso la Dra. Montessori.

La educación debería tener como base, y para la guía de su ejecución, una meta. No es
suficiente decir que el niño debe ser el centro de educación, nosotros debemos saber cual
es nuestra meta y procurar, proyectar la vida de la humanidad. El hombre nace; Él va
hacia adelante. Y si no, ¿a donde va? Uno debe tener un plan, así como todos los grandes
educadores en el pasado lo han tenido. Ellos pensaron y consideraron la meta final para la
humanidad, mientras la así llamada tendencia moderna científica de la educación es
enfocar toda su atención a ciertos detalles que casi no tienen relación unos con otros, y si
existe una meta después de todo, este es un material dirigido al individuo y su lugar en la
sociedad. No el lugar del hombre fuerte, quien busca la unión con otros hombres, logra
un plano superior para la humanidad, sino solamente un pequeño lugar el cual le permita
vivir.

No existe una gran visión de unión de los hombres para llevar adelante un plan cada vez
más noble. Cada hombre piensa en su propio trabajo; como ser un doctor, o una
profesora, o una enfermera en un hospital, y no esta educado para encontrar un lugar en la
noble y alta unidad de la humanidad. La grandeza de nuestra construcción social en
nuestros días, de la misión de la humanidad, esta como oculta detrás de un velo, y el
hombre no se pregunta a si mismo ¿Por qué el desea convertirse en doctor, o trabajar en
una escuela o en un hospital?

CHILD`S INSTINCT TO WORK - 1939

The following lecture was given by Dr. Montessori at the beginning of the XXIVth International Course in
London in 1939. The following is just as it was taken down in translation as Dr. Montessori spoke.

Education should have for its basis, and for the guidance of its construction, an aim. It is not sufficient to say that the
child must be the centre of education, we must know our aim and the trend we must follow in mapping out the life of
humanity. Man is born; he goes forth. But where does he go? One must have a plan as all great educators in the past
have had. They gave thought and consideration to the final aim of mankind, while the so-called scientific modern trend
of education is to focus its entire attention upon certain details which have almost no relation with each other, and if
there is an aim at all, it is a material one directed towards the individual and his place in society. Not the place of a
strong man who seeks union with other men seeking a higher plane of humanity, but just a little place which will allow
him to live.

There is not the great vision of the union of men leading to a plane always more lofty. Each man thinks of his own job;
how to become a doctor, or a teacher, or a nurse in a hospital, and is not educated to find a place in the noble and high
unity of humanity. The greatness of the social construction of our day, of the mission of humanity, is, as it were, hidden
behind a veil, and he does not ask himself WHY he wishes to become a doctor, or work in a school or hospital.
Y la personalidad de cada individuo esta disminuida por este hecho. Y es la falta de
educación si el individuo es empujado dentro de esos límites estrechos de los intereses
personales. Nosotros, los Montessorianos estamos convencidos de que el niño es retenido
por los adultos que lo rodean, a pesar de ser apreciado en su personalidad. Y esto no es
solamente una actitud del adulto hacia su propio niño, sino la actitud de la sociedad
entera, la cual por concepto de educación, llega al extremo de desvalorizar en lugar de
valorizar al niño.

And the personality of each individual is diminished by this fact. And it is the fault of education if the individual is
compelled into these narrow limits of personal interests. We Montessorians are convinced that the child is kept back by
the adults surrounding him, instead of being 'valorised' in his personality. And this is not merely the attitude of the
individual adult towards his own child, but it is the attitude of the whole of society, which by means of education, does
its utmost to devalorise instead of valorising the child.

La sociedad busca únicamente un trabajo en el mundo y por lo tanto disminuye el valor

de cada individuo. Mientras que el individuo debiera ser consciente de sus propios
limites, y del hecho de que el forma parte de una gran construcción. La civilización es tan
grande hoy en día que nosotros podríamos casi decir que es grandiosa, y cada individuo
debería ser consciente de esto y que el es una parte de ella.

Society seeks only a job in the world and thus diminishes the value of each individual. While the individual should
certainly be aware of his own limits, he should also be conscious of the fact that he forms part of a great construction.
Civilisation is so great today that we might almost call it grandiose, and each individual should be conscious of it and
of the part he takes in it.

There is another idea in scientific education today which is taken more and more into
consideration and that is that the individuality must be developed to its maximum
possibility. But how? An isolated individual cannot develop his individuality. If an
individual is isolated while at the same time forming part of this great construction which
is society today, he cannot become a strong individual personality. He must place himself
in relationship with his environment and within reach of the events and the life of his
times.

So we say that it is necessary to develop personality. But how is personality to be

developed? It can only be developed by means of social relationships and experiences.
But this is not achieved simply by thinking social life consists in getting out of it what is
necessary, such as food, clothing, etc.

Although the scientific aim of our education is the formation of the social personality, it
is not sufficient only to study the personality of the individual during its formative period.
We must not only be aware of this, but that the moral as well as the physical individual
lives at the expense of society. He gets not only the material means of life but also the
moral means of life. So we say that for the best possible development of the body, it must
come in relation with external things such as food, drink, warmth and so on, and indeed,
it would cease to exist unless it came into relation with physical things necessary for its
upkeep. Also spiritually the same thing is true, in order to develop this spiritual
organisation it must take from society continuously all that is necessary.

As I have said before, in the past education considered not only the formation of the
personality but also the finality of the individuality of man. From the religious point of
view, for instance, the aim of man's life, outside the construction of society, is eternal life.
So at the basis of education is the theory of philosophy. Then there were the philosophers
who took into consideration human life and its destiny, and so on, and these put into
education a certain basis, an equilibrium which is very necessary, giving peace and moral
strength. Today we are in the phase where scientific experience is of value. Who can
resist admiring such experience which has taught humanity not only to know but to
master the forces which rule in the world. Yet wherever there is talk of scientific research
in education today we are immediately faced by a reduction in culture and a breaking up
of subjects into small details. The scientific conception of today does not tend to make
man greater but to limit him. This is in contrast with the scientific researches and
discoveries which have been made in other fields and which have expanded and not
become more limited. Science has been full of revelations, when applied to the study of
biology, but applied to man it certainly has not presented anything great. On the contrary
it has made us lose some great conceptions of man previously held. Nevertheless in
scientific experience which touches reality and truth there must be something which will
help to reveal the greatness of man.

The path that science travels is a path of discoveries. What a magnificent step it would be
to discover the greatness of the individual and the greatness of society as a tangible
reality. In the past the conception of the greatness of individuality was to be found outside
society itself and in a metaphysical field. It was something which passed through society
and on to a better life. Evanescent, but at least something, and something is better than
nothing! To find a personality which has purpose and a great aim also in social life is
something in which science can help.

There is a saying that man is called to build the kingdom of heaven. And when one talks
about heaven one thinks of something very far away, but the same idea might be brought
a little nearer. Perhaps what I am about to say may seem rather difficult to understand, but
what we mean by the kingdom of heaven is not only the general idea of peace among
men, but that humanity in its entirety has a positive task to accomplish on this earth, and
as far as life is concerned this is the main thing. Humanity has not only aim of purifying
itself through its life on this earth and then to pass on to a better life, but it has a positive
task of construction upon this earth itself. We must take into consideration man the
creator. Humanity which is in itself a creating force. That humanity is building up
something as well known and what it builds is called civilisation.

Humanity does not come upon this earth merely to take a walk, and its loftiest aim is not
to be able to travel by means of an aeroplane instead of upon its feet. And its aim is not to
enjoy to the utmost life which is attached to material things, nor is it contemplative, or to
achieve a greater degree of comfort.
One must look for the aim of humanity in that activity which is transforming the earth.
Man is here to work and his work is not for the good of himself but for this great
construction which we call civilisation, and it has transformed the earth from what it was
to what it is, and is building up the social building which is civilisation today.

This conception is in fact the same as what really happens because all men must work
and all social life is based upon the work of man. But it is evident that if man merely
thinks of work as a means to provide a living it is a much lower conception than that of
the man who works in order to help his fellow men to build up cosmic work, work which
affects the whole world. This helps one to conceive work as something which invites and
helps instead of something which is forced upon one.

It is as if one was walking to the top of a mountain, and someone said: "Do not think
about this long walk, nor about the road you follow, but only that you must keep putting
one foot in front of the other". If one does that one becomes very tired, and the man who
plods along doing his job every day in order to get his weekly wage is doing something
which fatigues him. But if one is climbing the mountain with companions and everyone
is happy because they know where they are going, and there is talk and laughter, they get
to the top of the mountain without feeling fatigue, and yet they have done just the same as
the others - put one foot in front of the other.

What is the difference? It is that the conscience of man has been morally called upon
when mankind is morally conscious of the path that he follows, and this moral orientation
can be given by a touch, by a call, by something which does not represent work in itself;
it can transform the conscience of man and animate and urge and compel him to great
actions. Then the same work is done with enthusiasm instead of with fatigue. And it lends
dignity to man instead of humiliation at being forced to carry out a task simply because if
he does not do so he will starve and die.

To close I wish to say that the child has made this fact clear. The child has been the one
who has been capable of giving proof of this fact. The child is by nature a worker, and
when, by working in this special fashion, which is according to his nature, he can
accomplish a great deal of work without ever feeling fatigue. When he works in this way
he shows himself to be happy and by working in this way he also becomes cured of
certain psychic anomalies that he had, and by curing himself of these he enters into a
more natural form of life.

Therefore this work which has built up civilization and which has transformed the earth is
at the very basis of life and is a fundamental part of it. So much so, that it is, as we say,
even in the child. Work has existed in the nature of man as an instinct even from birth
itself. And this life of the child which is, we might say, the embryonic life of spiritual
man, attracts our attention and gives us certain explanations. The study of society will be
held to be a study of the life of the child which shows us in an embryonic stage this
profound tendency of humanity and the mechanism by which society is built up.

Maria Montessori
DR MONTESSORI WRITES OF SAN LORENZO - 1907

"How It All Happened", 1942

Dr. Montessori writes of San Lorenzo 1907

La Casa dei Bambini

This photo is probably the oldest photograph available of the Casa,
taken on the day of inauguration.

Following is a summary of a talk by Dr. Maria Montessori to her students on the 6th
January 1942, celebrating the anniversary of the inauguration day of the first House of
Children.

Today is the anniversary of the opening of the first House of Children. When I tell you
briefly how it started, the few words of its history will seem like a fairy-tale, but their
message may also prove useful.

Many times people ask with doubt in their minds whether the method is suitable for poor
children and whether it is at all adaptable to them.

In order that you may be able to answer such questions, I should like you to have a small
idea of how our work started, of the indirect way in which it has arisen.

It came about in a strange way, I have pondered much about it and tried to understand the
reason for it. I don't know if it is an indication of destiny, or if it was established by fate
itself. All that I know is that it has something to do with the House itself. It may seem
curious that I express it in this way but I do so to render the ensuing story clear.

Many years ago, Rome was a capital of a state in very rapid development, which
manifested itself in a mania for building. Every small available space was utilised to
build houses, every little open square. One of the many was delimited on one side by the
old Roman walls which had witnessed many battles and on the other by the modern
cemetery. This area was the last place to be filled, no doubt because of the superstition
that it was not lucky to live near the dead, for fear of ghosts and also for hygienic reasons.

But probably because of the beautiful and historical situation, one building society
decided to stake its money into building there. It was a tremendous scheme, five houses
on the scale of palaces, 5 or 6 stories high. But the idea had been too vast so that the
society went bankrupt before the building were completed and the scheme failed. The
work was interrupted and left to stand. There were only the walls with open holes for
doors and windows, there was no plumbing and the erections stood as a sort of skeleton.

For many years this enormous skeleton remained abandoned and neglected. It became a
shelter for homeless beggars, a hiding place for evildoers who wished to avoid
recognition and who if discovered, could easily escape in this labyrinth. Criminals of all
sorts, thieves and murderers, took refuge in them. People lived there in the same
conditions as the cavemen of old did in their caves.

All those who were homeless, and those who wished to hide, found shelter within those
walls. Even the police did not go near them, or dared to, as they did not know their way
within these grim walls of crime and horror.

Slowly, the number grew, until thousands of people crowded in these abandoned
buildings. People were found dead, murdered or succumbed to diseases; the place became
a breeding place of infection for the whole land; a centre of crime and of the lowest
prostitution.

The "Quartiere di San Lorenzo" became known as the shame of Italy. People were too
afraid to do anything about it; no one knew what happened within those dark walls. There
were no small shops for provisions anywhere near, no itinerant vendor would go there to
sell. Even the lowest labourer, or the poorest fisherman would seem as princes in
comparison, for however poor, they would have at least some honest livelihood whereas
those who lived inside that gloom had no work, no means to pay, their only livelihood
was derived from crime.

The problem of clearing this pit of inhumanity demanded a solution. Another building
society of very wealthy bankers, considered the problem and decided that as the walls
already stood, only a small expenditure would be necessary to make fruitful whatever
capital was invested. The district, due to its ill--repute, would of course never become a
fashionable quarter, therefore only small renovations were necessary to render it habitable
for these people already so unfortunate. Regarding it thus as a business venture, they
started with one building which they discovered would house a thousand people. They
used some whitewash, put in some doors and windows, and laid in a few water pipes and
drains.

It was estimated that in this area lived at least 10,000 people, therefore how could they
discriminate which among them would be the best? They chose the married ones who by
reason of their relation with one another would be the most human. As it happened there
were only very few children. It seems perhaps logical that under such conditions although
there were thousands of men and women there should be only fifty children.

But these children, wild and uncivilised as they were, presented a serious problem of
damage to the houses. Left alone while the parents went to work, they were free to carry
out any wild fancy. So the director of the concern decided that the only obvious thing to
keep them out of mischief was to collect all the children and confine them.

One room was set aside for this purpose, resembling in every way a children's prison. It
was hoped that a person would be found with enough social courage to tackle the
problem.
I in my capacity of medical officer of hygiene was approached to take an interest in the
work. Having considered the situation I demanded that at least the commonest aids in
hygiene, food and sanitation be made available.

At the time it had become fashionable among society ladies to interest themselves in
social uplift. They were approached to do something to collect funds, because we were
confronted with the strange problem that while the bankers had agreed to invest money to
improve the housing situation, they were not at all interested in education. One could not
expect any returns from money, put into anything with an educational purpose.

Although society had embraced the ideal of improving the condition of these unfortunate
people, the children had been forgotten. There were no toys, no school, no teacher. There
was nothing for them. I was able to find one woman of 40 years, whose help I asked and
who I put in charge.

On the 6th of January 1907 this room was inaugurated to collect the 50 children. The
room had already been in use for little time but it was inaugurated on that day.
Throughout Italy the 6th of January is looked upon as "the" day of feast for the children.
It was on this day that the three Kings arrived before the Child Christ and offered him
their gifts. It is celebrated as the Feast of Epiphany.

It was striking at the time this interest of society imbued with the idea that their giving
hygienic houses to the homeless would be the means of purifying the evil core in their
midst, consisting of a group of ten-thousand criminals and pitiful humanity. I also was
imbued with this sentiment.

But while everyone had had the idea that by giving houses and sanitation, the people
would be purified, no one had taken in consideration the children; no one had thought to
bring toys or food for them. When the children, ranging between the ages of 2 to 6
entered, they were dressed all alike in some thick, heavy, blue drill. They were frightened
and being hindered by the stiff material, could move neither arms nor legs freely. Apart of
their own community they had never seen any people. To get them to move together, they
were made to hold hands. The first unwilling child was pulled, thus dragging along the
whole line of the rest. All of them were crying miserably. The sympathy of the society
ladies was aroused and they expressed the hope that in a few months they would improve.

I had been asked to make a speech for the occasion. Earlier that day, remembering that it
was the feast of the Epiphany, I had read the lesson in my mass book. When I made my
speech I read it as an omen for the work to follow.

"Arise, be enlightened, O Jerusalem; for thy light is come, and the glory of the
Lord is risen upon thee, For behold darkness shall cover the earth, and a mist the
people; but the Lord shall arise upon thee, and His glory shall be seen upon thee.
And the Gentiles shall walk in thy light, and kings in the brightness of thy rising.
Lift up thy eyes round about, and see; all these are gathered together, they are
come to thee: thy sons shall come from afar, and thy daughters shall rise up at thy
 side. Then shalt thou see, and abound and thy heart shall wonder and be enlarged,
when the multitude of the sea shall be converted to thee, the strength of the
Gentiles shall come to thee. The multitude of camels shall cover thee, the
dromedaries of Madian and Epha; all they from Saba shall come, bringing gold
and frankincense, and showing forth praise to the Lord."

I don't know what came over me but I had a vision and inspired by it, I was enflamed and
said that this work we were undertaking would prove to be very important and that some
day people would come from all parts to see it.

In reporting this new whim of society, the press also mentioned that Dr. Montessori had
made a beautiful speech, but what an exaggeration in what she had said!

It was from then that the real work began.

Remember that all these children were completely illiterate. Their parents were also
illiterate and they were born and grown in the environment, I have described.

What happened more than thirty years ago now will always remain a mystery to me. I
have tried since then to understand what took place in those children. Certainly there was
nothing of what is to be found now in any House of Children. There were only rough
large tables.

I brought them some of the materials which had been used for our work in experimental
psychology, the items which we use today as sensorial material and materials for the
exercises of practical life. I merely wanted to study the children's reactions. I asked the
woman in charge not to interfere with them in any way as otherwise I would not be able
to observe them, Some one brought them paper and coloured pencils but in itself this was
not the explanation of the further events. There was no one who loved them, I myself
only visited them once a week and during the day the children had no communication
with their parents.

The children were quiet, they had no interference either from the teacher or from the
parents, but their environment contrasted vividly from that which they had been used to;
compared to that of their previous life; it seemed fantastically beautiful. The walls were
white, there was a green plot of grass outside, though no one had yet thought to plant
flowers in it, but most beautiful of all was the fact that they had interesting occupations in
which no one, no one at all, interfered. They were left alone and little by little the
children began to work with concentration and the transformation they underwent, was
noticeable. From timid and wild as they were before, the children became sociable and
communicative. They showed a different relationship with each other, of which I have
written in my books. Their personalities grew and, strange though it may seem, they
showed extraordinary understanding, activity, vivacity and confidence. They were happy
and joyous.
This fact was noticed after a while by the mothers who came to tell us about it. As the
children had had no one to teach them or interfere with their actions, they acted
spontaneously, their manners were natural.

But the most outstanding thing about these strange children of the St. Lawrence Quarter
was their obvious gratitude. I was as much surprised by this as everyone else. When I
entered the room all the children sprang to greet me and cried their welcome. Nobody had
taught them any manner of good behaviour. And the strangest thing of all was that
although nobody had cared for them physically, they flourished in health as if they had
been secretly fed on some nourishing food, And so they had, but in their spirit. These
children began to notice things in their homes, a spot of dirt on their mother's dress,
untidiness in the room. They told their mothers not to hang the washing in the windows
but to put flowers there instead. Their influence spread into the homes, so that after a
while also these became transformed.

Six months after the inauguration of the House of Children, some of the mothers came to
me and pleaded that as I had already done so much for their children, and they
themselves could do nothing about it because they were illiterate, would I not teach their
children to read and write?

At first I did not want to, being as prejudiced as every one else that the Children were far
too young for it. But I gave them the alphabet in the way I have told you. As then it was
something new for me also, I analysed the words for them and showed that each sound of
the words had a symbol by which it could be materialised. It was then that the explosion
into writing occurred.

The news spread and the whole world became interested in this phenomenal activity of
writing of these children who were so young and whom nobody had taught. The people
realised that they were confronted by a phenomenon that could not be explained for
besides writing, these children worked all the time without being forced by any one to do
so. This was a great revelation but it was not the only contribution of the children. It was
also they, who created the lesson of silence. They seemed to be a new type of children.
Their fame spread and in consequence all kinds of people visited the House of Children,
including State ministers and their wives, with whom the children behaved graciously
and beautifully, without anyone urging then, that even the newspapers in Italy and abroad
became excited. So the news spread, until finally also the Queen became interested. She
came to that quarter so ill famed that it was considered hell's doors, to see for herself the
children about whom she had heard wonders.

What was the wonder due to? No one could state it clearly. But it conquered me for ever,
because it penetrated my heart as a new light. One day I looked at them with eyes which
saw them differently and I asked myself: "Who are you, are you the same children you
were before?" And I said within myself: "Perhaps you are those children of whom it was
said that they would come to save humanity. If so, I shall follow you." Since then, I am
she who tries to grasp their message and to follow them.
And in order to follow them, I changed my whole life. I was nearly 40. I had in front of
me a doctors' career and a professorship at the University. But I left all, because I felt
compelled to follow them, and to find others who could follow them, for I saw that in
them lay the secret of the soul.

You must realise that what happened was something so great and so stirring that its
importance could never be sufficiently recognized. That it will never be sufficiently
studied, is certain, for it is the secret of life itself. We cannot fully know its causes. It is
not possible that it came because of my method, for at the time my method did not yet
exist. This is the clearest proof that it was a revelation that emanated from the children
themselves.

My educational method has grown from these as well as from many other revelations,
given by the children, You know from what I have told you, that all the details included in
the method, have come from the efforts to follow the child. The new path has been shown
us. No one knows exactly how it arose, it just came into being and showed us the new
way.

It has nothing to do with any educational method of the past, nor with any educational
method of the future. It stands alone as the contribution of the child himself. Perhaps it is
the first of its kind, which has been built by him step by step.

It cannot have come from an adult person; the thought, the very principle that the adult
should stand aside to make room for the child, could never have come from the adult.

Anyone who wants to follow my method must understand that he should not honour me
but follow the child as his leader.

Maria Montessori

"The Forgotten Citizen"

Parts from a Letter Written in 1947 and Sent to all
Governments
My life has been spent in the research of truth. Through study of children I have
scrutinised human nature at its origin both in the East and the West and although it is
forty years now since I began my work, childhood still seems to me an inexhaustible
source of revelations and - let me say - of hope.

Childhood has shown me that all humanity is one. All children talk, no matter what their
race or their circumstances or their family, more or less at the same age; they walk,
change their teeth, etc. at certain fixed periods of their life. In other aspects also,
especially in the psychical field, they are just as similar, just as susceptible.
Children are the constructors of men whom they build, taking from the environment
language, religion, customs and the peculiarities not only of the race, not only of the
nation, but even of a special district in which they develop.

Childhood constructs with what it finds. If the material is poor, the construction is
also poor. As far as civilisation is concerned the child is at the level of the food-
gatherers.

In order to build himself, he has to take by chance, whatever he finds in the

environment.

The child is the forgotten citizen, and yet, if statesmen and educationists once came to
realise the terrific force that is in childhood for good or for evil, I feel they would give it
priority above everything else.

All problems of humanity depend on man himself; if man is disregarded in his

construction, the problems will never be solved.

No child is a Bolshevist or a Fascist or a Democrat; they all become what

circumstances or the environment make them.

In our days when in spite of the terrible lessons of two world wars, the times ahead loom
as dark as ever before, I feel strongly that another field has to be explored, besides those
of economics and ideology. It is the study of MAN - not of adult man on whom every
appeal is wasted. He, economically insecure, remains bewildered in the maelstrom of
conflicting ideas and throws himself now on this side, now on that. Man must be
cultivated from the beginning of life when the great powers of nature are at work. It is
then that one can hope to plan for a better international understanding.

Maria Montessori

From a Letter of Dr. Montessori to Mrs Joosten- 1950

Ada tells me that the Press and the Radio in Holland have mentioned this (the awarding
of a Doctorate Honoris Causa). Will you send us some newspapers which carried the
news? It is the epoch of surprises for me. I was greeted with applause when I entered the
General Plenary Session of UNESCO. And here in Italy they have conferred upon me the
maximum level of ordinary Professorship at the University of Perugia. How shall I be
able to sustain all these things? Had I only the time to earn them. It is necessary to work
hard. Isn't that so?

I have met interesting people at UNESCO in Florence, especially among the delegates of
the East: India, China, Iraq, the Philippines, Lebanon, Pakistan, Egypt, Israel - all were
friends, all full of enthusiasm. I was surprised to see how alive the idea is among these
far-away populations; we almost embraced when we met. Also the President - or better
the Director General of UNESCO - Torres Bodet used to greet me and mentioned me in
his speeches.

Long live the CHILD.

Affectionately your Mammolina

DECALOGUE OF MARIA MONTESSORI

Never touch the child unless invited by him (in some form or the other).

Never speak ill of the child in his presence or absence.

Concentrate on strengthening and helping the development of what is good in the child so
that its presence may leave less and less space for evil.

Be active in preparing the environment. Take meticulous and constant care of it. Help the
child

establish constructive relations with it. Show the proper place where the means of
development are

kept and demonstrate their proper use

Be ever ready to answer the call of the child who stands in need of you and always listen
and

respond to the child who appeals to you.

Respect the child who makes a mistake and can then or later correct himself, but stop
firmly and immediately any misuse of the environment and any action which endangers
the child, his

development or others.

Respect the child who takes rest or watches others working or ponders over what he
himself has done or will do. Neither call him, nor force him to other forms of activity.

Help those who are in search of activity and cannot find it.
Be untiring in repeating presentations to the child who refused them earlier, in helping the
child

acquire what is not yet his own and overcome imperfections. Do this by animating the
environment

with care, with restraint and silence, with mild words and loving presence. Make your
ready presence

felt to the child who searches and hide from the child who has found.

Always treat the child with the best of good manners and offer him the best you have in
yourself and at your disposal

Extracts from Maria Montessori's Last Will and

Testament
...I declare that it is my wish that Mario Montessori be the general executor of this my
Will.

...with regard to my property, I declare that this belongs both materially and spiritually, to
my son:

that is, to him belong by right not only the material goods of every kind or sort that I may
eventually possess at any time of my life until the end; but to him belongs by right also,
everything that may accrue from my social and intellectual works, either because they
were inspired by him or because, from the time that he was able to act in the world, they
were undertaken with his actual and constant collaboration, since he totally dedicated his
life to helping me and my work.

Therefore he is the sole heir to my work, and the only one qualified to be entrusted with
the safekeeping and preservation of my work; and thus the legitimate and rightful
successor to the work that I have embarked upon and that I hope he may continue and
successfully complete, for the benefit of that humanity that together we have loved,
finding in our shared ideals and actions the highest solace of our lives.

So be it: and may his children bring him consolation; and may the world render him
justice, according to his merits, which I know to be great and sublime.
Revoking all preceding Wills, I declare this to be my last and only valid Will.

I sign with my name.

And so may friends and all those who benefit from my work, feel their debt toward my
son!...

MARIA MONTESSORI
Born in Chiaravalle in the Province of Ancona in 1870, Maria Montessori was the first
woman to practise medicine in Italy, having graduated from the Faculty of Medicine at
the University of Rome in 1896. As a physician, Dr. Montessori was in touch with young
children and became profoundly interested in their development.

Through careful and exhaustive scrutiny, she realised that children construct their own
personalities as they interact with their environment. She also observed the manner in
which they learned as they spontaneously chose and worked with the auto didactic
materials she provided.

Her approach to education stemmed from a solid grounding in biology, psychiatry and
anthropology . She studied children of all races and cultures in many countries around the
world, soon seeing the universality of the laws of human development played out before
her. She continued her observations throughout her life, widening and deepening her
understanding until her death in 1952.

Life's Work
Maria Montessori opened her first Casa dei Bambini (Children's House) in one of the
very poorest areas in Rome, the then notorious Quartiere di San Lorenzo.

"It was January 6th (1907), when the first school was opened for small, normal children
of between three and six years of age. I cannot say on my methods, for these did not yet
exist. But in the school that was opened my method was shortly to come into being. On
that day there was nothing to be seen but about fifty wretchedly poor children, rough and
shy in manner, many of them crying, almost all the children of illiterate parents, who had
been entrusted to my care"... "They were tearful, frightened children, so shy that it was
impossible to get them to speak; their faces were expressionless, with bewildered eyes as
though they had never seen anything in their lives."... "It would be interesting to know
the original circumstances that enabled these children to undergo such an extraordinary
transformation, or rather, that brought about the appearance of new children, whose souls
revealed themselves with such radiance as to spread a light through the whole world."

Indeed it was as though this radiance had been caught in a stream of consciousness, for a
mere six months after the opening of the Casa dei Bambini, people from all walks of life,
from every continent came to see Maria Montessori's miracle children.

In 1909 she gave her first Montessori course, expecting to have as students only Italian
teachers. To her amazement people attended from many different countries. Probably that
was the origin of what would become a serious handicap in the evolution of Montessori
pedagogy.

"Since the beginning Montessori pedagogy has been appropriated, interpreted,

misinterpreted, exploited, propagated, torn to shreds and the shreds magnified into
systems, reconstituted, used, abused and disabused, gone into oblivion and undergone
multiple renaissances." (Renilde Montessori)

There are various reasons why this should be so. Perhaps the most important is that
although Montessori pedagogy is known as the Montessori Method, it is not a method of
education, in other words, it is not a programme for teachers to apply. Maria Montessori
was not a teacher .... the Alpha and Omega of her pedagogy lies with the children.

Maria Montessori was a scientist, and as a good scientist, she was earth-bound and highly
spiritual in her pursuit of truth. She studied medicine, specialising in psychiatry and
anthropology. She was also an outstanding mathematician. Although she would never
have considered being a teacher, she studied educational methods for many years and
found them wanting, possibly because none of them took into account the two seemingly
paradoxical extremes which are at the centre of her pedagogy: the universal
characteristics of the human child, and the child as a unique, unrepeatable, respectable
and admirable individual to be unconditionally accepted as one of life's most marvellous
expressions.

MARIO MONTESSORI Mario Montessori, 1898 - 1982

Mario Montessori - a simple man, an innocent man. An extremely generous man, a shy
man, an exuberant man. A contemplative man, but an active man. A man who loved life
passionately and remained young till the day he died.

He loved the earth; what was hidden in it; what lived and grew on it. He loved the sky,
the sun, the clouds, the moon and the stars. He loved the wind, the storms and the sea. He
loved to fight the elements. He loved to ride, to row and to swim. Always impeccably
groomed, he liked good clothes, and as a young man sported spats and hats and fancy
waistcoats. He loved giving extravagant presents - never one rose but at least sixty! He
loved food; he loved to cook; he loved to drink and smoke. He loved pretty girls, music
and song: there was nothing ascetic about him, though he chose to live an ascetic life.

He was a born teacher. He loved children and especially tiny babies whom he called
miracle makers, and with whom he held long conversations, which the newborns, staring
at his lips, followed with fascination.

But all his many loves were nothing compared to his love for his mother and her work.
An all encompassing love which dominated his whole existence. His dedication to her
was conscious and free choice, not a result of mother/son attachment. After all he was
almost fifteen years old when he first knew and lived with her - too late in life to grow a
subconscious Oedipus complex. She had no place in his absorbent mind period. There
could have been no question on either side of being unable to sever the umbilical cord.
He lived for her, with her but not through her. The amazing thing about this man with no
real scholastic or academic background was the clarity of his total understanding of the
working of her mind. His intuitive intelligence and openness of spirit allowed him to
keep abreast with her quantum leaps from the first to the nth dimension - even sometimes
arriving just ahead, thus enabling her to soar even further. Nothing she deducted,
developed or stated ever surprised him.

Thanks to him, she never suffered the isolation common to genius, never became static.
But he was not just a very bright sounding board for her ideas; he helped her to clarify
them and give them shape, enabling her to continue developing her unique mind to the
end. As she grew older he took more and more of her workload on himself, organising
courses, examining students, lecturing on materials, practical life etc. He coped with all
details and unexpected complications during the training courses.

By protecting her from all practical details, he enabled Maria Montessori to concentrate
fully on her creative work. He presented her with new ideas, not only reactions. As the
years advanced, their complicity became total. Without him she would have grown
frustrated by the lack of understanding, retreating into her spiritual isolation, unable to
cope and fight alone to preserve the purity of her work.

By his understanding, his enthusiasm and belief in the significance of her cosmic vision
for the development of mankind, he became a pillar of her work. He continued her fight
after she died. Against all odds, all struggles for power, all intrigues, he continued the
fight for the child - the child, father of man.

Mario Montessori, my father, was an extraordinary man.

Marilena Henny – Montessori

SOME REFLECTIONS ON EDUCATION AND PEACE -1937

Recent events have encouraged an increasing number of people to voice, once again, a
time-worn fallacy that it is human nature to settle arguments by force. So, it is argued,
wars must necessarily continue to be.

Large numbers of men and women devote their lives to the study of the hidden causes of
natural cataclysms such as earthquakes, which man is powerless to overcome. Yet war,
which depends on mankind and is an exclusively human phenomenon, is allowed to
continue. What is generally accepted as peace is merely a cessation from war, a purely
negative achievement.

Look what civilisation has achieved through the centuries! Consider only the last fifty
years of scientific progress! Take away scientific improvements and you find men using
the same expressions and making the same excuses for their acts of violence as they did
centuries ago.

If we wish to set about a sane rebuilding of mankind we must go back to the child. The
question of the child and its education therefore becomes a social problem of the greatest
importance, affecting men and women of every race, clime and class. According to how
we educate our children will come the triumph or calamity of the future. Herein lies the
part which education has to play in the struggle between peace and war. It should be
remembered that the child, a passionate lover of order and work, possesses intellectual
qualities superior by far to what might be expected.

Under present educational conditions, the child not only withdraws within himself, but
has to dissimulate his powers so as to adapt himself to the judgment of the adult who
lords it over him. The child learns from his environment and his first instincts are to
attempt to do things for himself. If the growth of the child's intelligence is stopped by
forbidding him to construct and he is continually discouraged and scolded, he ends by
acquiring a mixture of distrust in his own powers and of shyness which, in the grown
man, takes the form of discouragement and submission.

It seems almost too obvious to say that two things are needed in order to establish the
Peace of the World - a new type of man and, above all, an environment that should no
longer set a limit to the infinite desire of man.

Dr. Maria Montessori said:

"There is an absolute disorganisation of humanity. Men are educated to consider

themselves as isolated individuals who have to satisfy their own immediate interests in
competition with other individuals. Instead, there should be a powerful organisation to
understand and to organise social events, to propose and to pursue collective aims, thus
ordaining the progress of civilisation.

Today there is only an organisation of things but not of man. The environment is the only
thing organised. Technical progress has set in motion a formidable mechanism that now
moves of its own accord and drags the individuals after itself, as a magnet drags up a
cloud of dust, and they are crushed in its gearing. This can be said of everybody, manual
and intellectual workers as well. They are all isolated in their interest. They are only
looking for the profession that secures their material life. They are all drawn and
absorbed by the material machines or the bureaucratic mechanisms. But it is evident that
mechanism cannot draw mankind towards progress because progress must depend on the
man himself. There should be a moment when mankind should take command of its
products and assume the directive. This moment has arrived."

Again, to return to the child - is it not taught a false idea of heroism from its earliest
years?

During that formative period, when the soft clay is being moulded and impressions are
easiest to make, children are impressed with the greatness of certain persons. Those
persons may be described as heroes, civilisers or supermen who have sacrificed their
(literally of metaphorically) to a sacred cause. In every child's mind is fostered the desire
to imitate those persons or become a follower of someone like them.

If the children belong to a suppressed nation then those same persons, heroes in the one
case, are looked upon as wholesale murderers and supergangsters, who have suddenly
fallen upon weaponless, innocent citizens. To kill such monsters and deliver their soil
from oppressions becomes the innermost aspiration of every member of that nation. In
the former, as well as in the latter case, the child is taught that being capable of enduring
pain and fatigue without flickering an eyelash is the essential of the he-man - subtle,
indirect, psychological means of preparing the right human material for future conflict
between peoples.

Dr. Montessori wrote: "It is necessary to develop the spiritual life of man and then to
organise mankind for Peace. Peace has its positive side in reconstruction of human
society on scientifically determined bases. The peaceful social harmony should have a
unique foundation - this cannot be but man himself.

"The reconstruction that is a stable and definitive settlement is not taken into
consideration by politics which have a preserving point of view. Instead, it is clear that
the sudden and fantastic evolution in the organisation of the environment during the last
fifty years, due to scientific discoveries, has changed the conditions of human life so
much that it is necessary to consider the human side in order to help the evolution of men
themselves.

This is the task of education."

Mario M. Montessori

The quotations of Dr. Maria Montessori have been taken from the foreword to Education
and Peace.
By Mario Montessori

Reprinted here from "Correspondence - Mario M. Montessori to Margot Waltuch, 1938-

1982" with the kind permission of Margot Waltuch.

Amsterdam, Holland
February 6, 1950

Dear Margot,

I now may first of all congratulate you and your husband with the new baby. Mrs. Joosten
showed us the picture and we found it very touching and I can imagine how happy you
must be after the difficult times you had here in Europe, to be safe in America and to be a
mother. We feel that the baby is very fortunate to have you as his mother, for there are
only few people who would know how to treat him better than you!.

It has been impossible for us to write to you before because of the huge amount of work
that we had to do and because we had to move about quite a lot. Let me first of all tell
you news about Dr. Montessori herself who, with me, was rejoiced to hear that you had
become a friend of Leena Mangaldas who reciprocates the esteem and the affection that
you feel for her.

Coming to the news: Dr. Montessori was very brilliant at the Congress at San Remo:
perhaps the reception she received inspired her even more than usual. For her compatriots
gave her a great reception: people cried when she spoke and in Bologna and Perugia,
which she visited afterwards, (to speak at the Universities), I saw people kneeling in the
street as she passed between them to reach her car. The whole press was unanimous in her
praise, there was no squabbling between the Socialists and Monarchists and Communists!
The Communists were represented and the Vatican State sent an official delegate. And,
although it is usually the case that if one of them supports either a person or a movement,
the other will combat it, in her case they understood that she was above all human ideas
of power and partial idealism. The international public also responded well. Twenty
nations were represented at the Congress: 15 governments sent official delegates. People
came from as far away as India and Ceylon.

I have still to mention that we reestablished the International Montessori Association in

Amsterdam. Various branches are functioning in: Holland, Italy, England, Scotland and
Eire. New Montessori societies are going to be opened in Greece, France, Austria,
Germany and Sweden. In America, there are societies in Chile and in Brazil, and one is
going to be opened in the Argentine.

During this year Dr. Montessori will celebrate her 80th birthday. People all over the
world are planning to render her honour. The French Government has made her an officer
of the Légion d'Honneur and the UNESCO gave a luncheon in her honour. At this
luncheon, Dr. Torres Bodet hailed her as the inspirer of all different methods composing
the New Education Movement.

As soon as it will be printed I shall send you the book about the activity of the Congress.
Meanwhile, I am sending you some pamphlets I have over here. Perhaps you know some
people who would be interested to become members of our Association. If so, could you
perhaps approach them on the subject.

I still forgot to tell you that the American Federation of Teachers sent a message to the
Congress which was very much appreciated by us.

Dr. Montessori has had five new books published since the end of the war. I do not know
if they are available in America, but I believe that you can obtain them at the
Theosophical Publishing House in Chicago. The books meant are: The Discovery of the
Child, (which is a reprint of The Montessori Method), The Absorbent Mind which is a
new book, To Educate the Human Potential which is also a new book. One book has been
published in France: De l'Enfant à l'Adolescent and another has been published in Italy,
La Formazione dell'Uomo. All the old books of Dr. Montessori have been reprinted in
Italy and here in Holland, and some of them are in reprint in France and in Sweden. Dr.
Montessori is still busy writing other books.

I wonder if there is a possibility of publishing any articles in educational and

psychological magazines to make the new work of Dr. Montessori known to the
American public.

Yours very sincerely,

Mario M. Montessori

This article was written by Mario M. Montessori to announce the publication

of one of the booklets made by Anna Maccheroni about the Montessori
music material.

When Man appeared upon the earth something appeared with him that had been denied to
animals: a spiritual nature to which later was given the name of soul. Because of this
nature human beings could not live alone, for no spirit can survive in a total isolation. Yet
each human being was in danger of another kind of solitude, for no language existed that
could be inherited or transmitted by heredity.

Human feelings there were, and the urge of human ideas. There was, we imagine, a flow
of sentiment that sprang from man's spirit but none of these could span the gap that
separated individual from individual. This was the plight of the few groups of men and
women scattered over the wilderness of the earth.

Out of the very breath of life a solution was found. By slightly increasing its power as it
came from the mouth, by letting it play upon the harp that man housed in his throat,
sounds could be produced. A conventional meaning was given to groups of these sounds
and words were fashioned. Ephemeral they were - they ceased to exist as soon as they
were uttered but they shattered the chains that held imprisoned the newly fashioned souls
which, to continue to exist, needed communication. Wherever human beings found
themselves together, in the tropics or in the icy wastes, out of the human mind a language
was born - a life-giving link more enduring than life itself - for people died but language
lasted, and through it mind could communicate with mind forever after.

Another need these souls had, just as impelling though more obscurely felt. This was so
deep that words alone were inadequate for its needs. It required another form of
expression; something that could mirror more adequately the sentiments of men when the
joys and sorrows overflowed the channels of expression offered by language; something
that could portray the majesty of those higher feelings, touched with the perfume of the
sacred and divine that rise on occasion from the innermost recesses of man's soul. It had
to take a form that would enable the soul to thrill with other souls or, at other times, to
rise to unknown heights and - itself immersed in spiritual silence - to be transported by a
flood of sound that fused it with other spirits similarly uplifted.

In answer to this need music was born. Thereafter, language for communication between
minds and music for the communion of souls formed part of the sacred heritage that each
group of men transmitted to their children.

Some facts about small children

At birth the child possesses neither language nor music but who has not seen a weeping
baby become calm when music is played to him? Who has not been amused to see a child
of two - or younger - attempt dancing steps hearing rhythmic music? What parent is not
alarmed if his child at two has not yet begun to talk? Evidently, both language and music
exercise a powerful attraction upon the psyche of the children.

In spite of their extreme immaturity small children seem able to appreciate, understand
and retain every detail of pronunciation, construction and other intricacies of language
with greater ease than more mature minds. What is more difficult in fact, even for
scholars, than to learn Greek? Yet how rapidly, as it seems to us, do Grecian three-year-
olds prattle in their own country. The same is true of music. Generally, it is very difficult
for a European to understand Indian music, even after years of living in the country but
young Indian children follow enraptured quite long concerts, shaking their heads in the
proper tempo and moving their hands to mark the seemingly peculiar pattern of the
music. The young child's mind is different from that of older people. To learn a foreign
language, for instance, the latter have to apply themselves deliberately and expend
purposeful effort. The child does not study books, does not follow lessons, exerts no
effort. The child does not learn language, he absorbs it as a dry sponge absorbs water.
Language seems to grow in the child. Given the chance, music can also grow in the child
as he himself grows.
Dr. Montessori and the child.
Dr. Montessori was one of the truest interpreters of the child's nature and of the child's
needs. Her books, The Discovery of the Child, The Secret of Childhood and The
Absorbent Mind, by unfolding the real purport of psychic organisation, reveal the
greatness of the child's contribution to human society.

These are some of Dr. Montessori's own words:

"if the child is born without speech, without movement, without any reasoning
intelligence and grows into the active, intelligent, talkative little person that we know by
the age of three, there must be a vital, irresistible force at work in him which leads him to
acquire these attributes".

"An adult finds it very difficult to become adapted to a new environment and to a totally
different pattern of culture. The child becomes adapted to any environment or to any
culture within which he grows. The mind of the child has the power to absorb without
effort everything that it finds in its neighbourhood. Nature seems to have entrusted the
children with the stupendous task of building men and women perfectly adapted to their
surroundings."

When Dr. Montessori began her educational work she looked around to see what facilities
existed for the child. "Not a chair", she says, "not a table, not a thing for the child to use
while building within himself the culture of his country and his day. Children lived in a
world of giants whose possessions they were forbidden to touch." This was the situation
as regards external things. The grown-up's attitude towards the child is best indicated by
the precepts of the time-.

 "Children should be seen and not heard".

 "The child must be obedient".
 "The child has to be fed, washed, dressed, combed. He must not be allowed to do
these things for himself. He lacks the ability, he is too slow, too clumsy, too
untidy".
 "Don't touch".
 "Keep still".

"If the child has to take the culture of the country from his environment", thought Dr.
Montessori, "his task will be made easier if an environment is provided proportionate
both to his size and to his intelligence". "Experience, activity and movement", she
proclaimed, "are necessary for the normal development of the child". She provided both
and was deeply touched by the transformation which came over the first group of
children to be entrusted to her care. From their reactions guidance was obtained as to the
best ways in which to aid children's tendencies in their natural development. It was others
who labelled these the Montessori Method.
But what Dr. Montessori really had at heart was the plight of childhood, the needs which
were not realised by society. The task of making the child understood - and of preparing
"the world of the child" - became almost a religious duty for Dr. Montessori. She was
soon joined by several young women. They formed a group that lived and worked
together and they set out to implement their mission with the discipline and determination
of a Religious Order.

One of the young ladies who joined Dr. Montessori was Professor Anna Maccheroni,
whose accomplishments included a thorough knowledge of music. Under Dr.
Montessori's direction she began to explore ways of including music among the items to
be absorbed in the course of children's natural development.

Music for children

"If language and music are natural needs of the human being, why is the study of music
such a tiresome burden?" This question is asked even today. The answer is simple. There
is nothing in the environment that enables the child to grow into music as he grows into
language. Without a suitable environment the child is unable to carry out his constructive
activities. We have seen that Greek is difficult to learn when studied at school but the
three-year-olds of Greece speak it fluently.

Professor Maccheroni, who on the 11th of August 1956 will be eighty years old, has
dedicated fifty years of her life to the preparation of a musical environment suitable for
children of different ages, to the determination of the nature of activities and, following
the lines laid down by Dr. Montessori, to the establishment of methods of introducing
them to the children.

It is impossible to illustrate adequately what Professor Maccheroni has accomplished.

Her work is an exquisite miniature of tiny details in which music and the child's psyche
are closely interwoven. Beginning with the child who, at two-and-a-half, seems to fall in
love with the sound of a single note that he produces by striking a bell with a tiny wooden
hammer and passing through many activities which, at three, include 'Walking along the
Melody', she accompanies the child until he is twelve. By then, the child has had
experience in singing, in executing dance steps, in the playing of simple instruments and
in listening to concert music. But the impressive fact is that without effort, without
tiresome drudgery, through a process that gives the child the feeling of having discovered
it all himself, he becomes familiar with the various aspects of musical theory. Incredibly,
he is conversant with rhythmic design; with the degree and the family of scales; with
transposition and modulation; with the analysis of musical phrases and graphics, writing
of music; homophony, polyphony and harmony. Nor is that all. Through Professor
Maccheroni's efforts the child has at last been enabled to enter into possession of the
second part of the spiritual inheritance humanity bestows upon its children.
Now, her task finished, her book ready for publication, Professor Maccheroni has
honoured the Association Montessori Internationale with the task of making known this
facet of the Montessori Method.

Mario M. Montessori

50TH ANIVERSARY OF AMI

Somewhat prophetically, our century had been dubbed as the "Century of the Child". It
seemed ironical because conditions seemed to be opposite to what the child needs, from
its very beginning the new century recorded earthquakes, social disorders, revolutions
and such international disruptions that they culminated in the First World War. Yet the
prophecy seemed to assert itself for in the midst of all the chaos, childhood seemed to
have assumed novel proportions and great importance for during this period sprouted new
approaches to child education, so many that the need was felt to collect them in an
international movement, the N.E.F. . From its inception the "New Education Fellowship",
hoping to lead to a common intent, tried to collect together in congresses all the
innovators which had given new directives and expounded new ideas, Unfortunately,
these were so disparaging and contradictory that, instead of bringing new light, they
created such a confusion in the mind of the attendants that, after one of the most crowded
congresses, some of the delegates proposed to keep the initials "N.E.F" but to put a new
meaning - "No Education Fellowship".

By then the so-called "Montessori Method" was already widespread. In various nations of
the world existed Montessori societies which functioned independently one from the
other and often deviated from the original tenets. That gave us the idea of forming a
central body which would concentrate not so much on the child but on Dr. Montessori
herself, to give her the support and the opportunity to continue her work. Because even
from some Montessori societies came the impression that Dr. Montessori had done
enough and had given all she had to give. This happened in the summer of 1929, after one
of the N.E.F. Congresses. A few of her closer collaborators joined together as they usually
did during this period, to keep company with Dr. Montessori during a brief period of rest,
to gather from her new directives. Her 3-6 programme had been completed as well as part
of her approach to the education of elementary children.

Finished? She showed that new research was necessary. She had witnessed the deviations and
the process of 'normalisation' and she had rationalised that something must have occurred in
the treatment of the child before three years which had caused

the deviation and concluded that when children were given proper conditions these had
been substituted by a process of normalisation. Far from being finished, she received new
incentives, because from then on, she used to say, "we must investigate that period". That
produced a shock similar to that when she had extended education to the three-year olds.
People objected to her that below that age children were too young for education, but she
said, "I don't mean a pedagogical learning method, indeed education should be conceived
as an 'aid to life'.

If there is any age which needs more assistance it is the stage that goes from 0-3. It is
during this period that the greatest and most important developments take place. It is a
tremendous task. It is a period in which the child 'incarnates' humanity. This was
confirmed by the research of Dr. Alexis Carrel who, in his book, L'HOMME CET
INCONNU, said that the accomplishments of the child were comparable to what man
could achieve in 60 years. So that the three-year old, because of its achievements, ought
to be regarded with parallel respect and veneration. In our minds the child assumed new
proportions.

Yes, Dr. Montessori had done a lot but to her mind certainly not enough. Relating to her
observations of older children, Dr. Montessori said that the first period was not the only
one in which the child needed help. In the construction of the human being, for it is the
child, not we educators, who builds man, there was another period which was just as
critical. She remarked that there is a strange parallelism between first infancy and
puberty. The puber is as fragile in health as the newborn. Psychologically he meets with
similar difficulties and impediments to his normal development. That is why this period
is called a difficult age and deviations arise similar to those of the child from 0-3. Yet
physiologically it is a period of tremendous importance for the individual. "One might
say that the human being undergoes two births and the second one occurs at puberty". It
is a period of tremendous importance especially because it is then that psychologically
the human being acquires the first tendency of assuming a mission for life.

Thus was Maria Montessori in 1929 when the A.M.I. was born with her as president. She
was far from finished. In her intellectual development she seemed to have become a
puber and achieved a second birth. Since then this desire to investigate the two periods
seemed to have become rooted in her unconscious because she wrote The Absorbent
Mind, she created the 'Cosmic education', which confirmed in the second cycle of the
child's life the impressions of Sheila Radice, Editor of the Literary Times of London. She
had followed Dr. Montessori's first course in London, visited the Montessori schools
connected with it and she wrote a book. The only title that could do justice to what she
had witnesses was The New Children, for indeed these were different creatures from the
whiny, fearful children she knew. These children did not ask to be helped in every action
in their life. Far from it, they resented being helped, yet they were good-mannered,
spontaneous in their greetings. They could eat neatly by themselves, set their own table,
wash dishes, and furniture, dust , shine, indeed attend to all their personal needs and those
of their environment. They were proud of being allowed and able to do all of these things
which were considered bothersome chores. Instead they preferred 'work' to playing with
toys. Their attention, instead of flitting from one thing to another, tended to concentrate
on their tasks. Instead of quarrelling and snatching things from one another they
spontaneously helped when one of them seemed to be in difficulty. And wonders of
wonders, they had taught themselves to write and read and more wonderful still,
arithmetic and geometry, which was the bugbear of older children in the elementary
school, were the occupations that gave them the greatest joys. It was inconceivable, they
were indeed new children.

Once the Cosmic plan had been introduced this transformation asserted itself, with the children
from six to twelve years of age. Instead of being coaxed to work and study, they fell into
spontaneous activity and research with greed. All subjects seemed to attract them. History from
the formation of the earth with all correlated subjects, of physics, geography, and the magic of
chemical transformations, evolution of life from unicellular through the eras to the appearance
of man, vegetable and animal classification, grammar, literature and its history, mathematics,
including roots and algebra, besides the subjects required by the public school curriculum, the
list of which was hung on the walls. They seemed indefatigable, as if hungry. Dr. Montessori used
to call it 'mental starvation'. She deduced "This is the age in which the seeds of the subject must
be planted. It is a fertile soil accompanied by the force of growing life". It was enough to put a
seed, give a key, indications for research, appropriate books and materials, freedom of work and
they would devour all that they found and discovered. They seemed mature beings with a sense
of responsibility for what was required from them by educational authorities and towards the
plants and the animals they kept and observed in the class and whose needs they provided for.
They worked in groups

and shared experiences and knowledge. If a visitor from another planet had come and
been asked which is the best example of man he would have pointed out the twelve-year
old: strong of body and mind, calm, equilibrated, with a sense of responsibility for
humanity, environment and life.

But then puberty, with its new fragility, its sudden weakness and its all-pervading
problems.

Dr. Montessori had become too old for personal research but out of all her experience
derived from the first two phases of development, she gave directives for her programme
for the puber, 'The Erdkinder'. Those of the now puber society, the A.M.I., who had the
fortune to share her life and her work shared also the faith in the child and her vision that
if conditions were created to help the potential of the individual, instead of constricting it
in educational concepts created by adult minds, a new and better humanity would be
achieved.

Dr. Montessori died in 1952 and the surviving but aged collaborators tried to organise the
efforts and the research. They realised, however, that alone they would never be able to
achieve it in their lifetime. The faith in the child has certainly not diminished in them and
it seems to have now spread in the universal unconscious because this year was
proclaimed by the United Nations to be the International Year of the Child, thus calling
upon the child the attention of the whole world.

We consider it a good omen that this year coincides with the Golden Jubilee Year of the
A.M.I. which was created for ensuring and preaching conditions which would favour the
development of the child in all its phases of development, at all moments of its human
constructive programme because it shared the faith of Dr. Montessori and her vision that
if proper conditions were created, the result would be a novel and better humanity. It is
with the aim of soliciting aid to this vision that A.M.I. has called its 19th Congress so that
the best minds and the most generous hearts would gather together to HELP THE
CHILD TO SHAPE MAN'S FUTURE.

Mario M. Montessori

Letter from Ada Montessori announcing the death of Mario M. Montessori,

1982

The following letter was sent to all individual members of AMI.

Baarn, February 1982

It is with the greatest sorrow that I have to announce to you that my husband Mario M.
Montessori Sr. died very suddenly on February 10th.

As many of you know, his health and particularly his eyesight had been failing lately and
he was ready to leave. We cannot but let him go with peace in our hearts, grateful that he
was freed from an existence of increasing dependence.

He was bidden farewell at a simple ceremony befitting the infinite kindness of his spirit,
attended by his children, many of his grandchildren and a gathering of old friends and
new from several countries; surrounded by flowers, before a calm Dutch landscape hazy
in the early spring sun.

The legacy he leaves us is his faith that the work of the A.M.I. will be continued. Let us
justify this faith and in unity carry on the labour to which he dedicated his life, with
generosity and the wisdom of love.

In friendship, Ada Montessori

DISTANCE LEARNING

Question: I have become very interested in the Montessori method of education and
would like to study for an AMI diploma. Can I do this by a “distance learning
programme”?

Answer: The Montessori approach offers a broad vision of education as an aid to life. It
is designed to help children with their task of inner construction as they grow from
childhood to maturity. It succeeds because it draws its principles from the natural
development of the child. Its flexibility provides a matrix within which each individual
child's inner directives freely guide the child toward wholesome growth.

The preparation of the adult about to undertake work with young children demands a high
degree of self-discipline and commitment, and a professional attitude. This preparation
can only be achieved through immersion in the Montessori theory under the supervision
of experienced lecturers. Furthermore, the special materials to be used with the children
in a Montessori class require individual training and supervised practice—as each piece
of apparatus has a function in the total scheme of the Montessori Prepared Environment.

These fundamental aspects cannot be covered in sufficient depth by distance learning.

Courses leading to the AMI diploma are run by AMI-accredited training centres
throughout the world. These courses are internationally recognised for their high standard
and authenticity. Montessori training is a process of re-orientation where students begin
to discover for themselves the profound truths underlying the Montessori approach.
Courses are full-time and are offered over an academic year or several summers. The
course programme includes lectures, seminars and demonstrations on Montessori
philosophy, child development and the Montessori materials. Each course also includes
significant components of observation, supervised practice with the materials, material
making and teaching practice. Students prepare an album which details the purpose, use
and presentation of each piece of material. In the words of Dr. Montessori the teacher
‘must give her lesson, plant the seed and then disappear; observing and waiting’ (The Call
of Education, Vol. 11, no. IV, December, 1925). This apparently simple proverb continues
to be a piece of worthwhile advice and a source of inspiration. It is at the core of the role
of the Montessori teacher.