|
Front: Maria Montessori (1870-1952), educational reformer
Maria Montessori was born in Chiaravalle, Italy. She decided to study medicine
at a time when it was considered impossible for a woman to be accepted into a
medical school. She enrolled at the University of Rome. Since they did not admit
women into the medical program, she decided instead to study physics, mathematics
and natural sciences. In 1892, she passed her exams and received a Diploma di
licenza that made her eligible to study medicine. The problem of course was she was
a woman. Somehow she persisted and was finally accepted into the medical school. In
1896 she was granted the degree of doctor of medicine, making her the first woman to
graduate from medical school in Italy.
Maria joined the staff at the University of Rome as a voluntary assistant in 1897.
One of her responsibilities was to visit asylums for the insane. Here she came
across feebleminded children, unable to function in schools. She saw that they were
starving for experience and started to think about what she could do to help out.
So in 1901 she returned to the University with a desire to study the mind instead of
the body. In 1906 she started working with sixty young children. This was where she
developed all of her educational methods, which became so successful that even
learning disabled children began to pass examinations for normal children.
Back: Teacher and student
|
