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Born to Alessandro Montessori and Renilde Stoppani in Chiaravalle, Italy
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Maria attended Regio Instituto Tecnico Leonardo da Vinci with the intent of becoming an engineer; a rather unusual vocation/desire for women at the time.
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Maria studied at the University of Rome to become a doctor. She graduated with her degree; this allowed her to enter the Faculty of Medicine. She was the first woman to study medicine in Italy.
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Maria was the first woman to qualify as a doctor in the country. She was employed at the San Giovanni Hospital at the University.
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Maria represented Italy at the International Congress for Women’s Rights in Berlin. She was extremely passionate about equal rights for women and became involved in actively achieving those rights.
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Maria became a surgical assistant at the Santo Spirito Hospital in Rome. She primarily worked with children; she was recognized for her bedside manner with all of her patients.
She joined a research program with the University of Rome's psychiatric clinic; thus starting her work with Giusseppe Montesano.
She studied the work of Jean-Marc Itard and Edouard Séguin. Séguin developed several perceptions that Montessori would later use. -
Montessori addressed the National Medical Congress in Turin; she theorized that the delinquency of children at the asylum was a result of their not having proficient materials and education.
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Maria Montessori gave birth to her son, Mario. He was fathered by Guisseppe Montesano; Guisseppe and Maria had a hidden romance known only by those closest to them.
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Montessori spoke at the National Pedagogical Congress; she presented an educational theory to help children develop to their optimal potential. This theory would develop and grow throughout her life.
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Maria became co-director of the Orthophrenic School for developmentally diasbled children with Guisseppe Montesano. She used the opportunity to further develop Itard's, Séguin's, and her own theory through scientific observation of the children.
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Maria lectured at the Pedagogic School of the University of Rome.
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The Italian government gave Maria the opportunity to test her teaching methods - developed at the Orthophrenic School - with "normal" children within the 3-6 year range.
Her methods focused on following the children through their natural inclinaions and interests; the prepared environment helped in allowing this natural learning to occur. -
By this point there were 5 Case dei Bambini in Italy.
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Montessori addressed 100 students in her first lecture based on her educational theory. The notes from this lecture became The Montessori Method, her first book.
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Montessori's mother passed away at the age of 72. The loss of her mother affected Maria greatly.
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Maria brought her son Mario to join her in her travels. (the image is from their time in India)
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Maria made her first trip to the United States. Strong American supporters of her work include Alexander Graham Bell, Thomas Edison, and Helen Keller.
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At the Panama-Pacific International Exhibition in San Francisco, Maria exhibited a "glass house" classroom in which onlookers could see her theory at work.
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Maria was appointed the Italian government inspector of schools.
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Maria and Mario were forced to flee Italy due to her opposition of Mussolini.
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Maria and Mario traveled to India for a three-month lecture. Due to the outbreak of WWII they were forced to stay under house-arrest (Mario also spent a lot of time interned). Maria spent this time further developing her theory and visiting with leaders like Gandhi.
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Maria addressed UNESCO on the theme ‘Education and Peace’.
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Maria received her first Nobel Peace Prize nomination (she would receive two more nominations).
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Maria passed away peacefully in Noordwijk aan Zee, Netherlands.
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Urie Bronfenbrenner was another educational theologist. His theory (discussed in his 1979 book The Ecology of Human Development) shows the child as the central level of a 5 level system. The microsystem (relationships with family, peers, and school); the mesosystem (relationships between the parts of the microsystem); the exosystem (the larger community); the macrosystem (culture, economics, politics); and the chronosystem (influence of a child's personal history).
