A Montessori Mother

Maria Montessori
BY DOROTHY CANFIELD FISHER Author of “The Squirrel-Cage”
ILLUSTRATED
NEW YORK HENRY HOLT AND COMPANY 1913
Copyright, 1912, BY HENRY HOLT AND COMPANY Published October, 1912 THE QUINN & BODEN CO. PRESS RAHWAY, N. J.
DEDICATED BY PERMISSION TO MARIA MONTESSORI

On my return recently from a somewhat prolonged stay in Rome, I observed that my family and circle of friends were in a very different state of mind from that usually found by the home-coming traveler. I was not depressed by the usual conscientious effort to appear interested in what I had seen; not once did I encounter the wavering eye and flagging attention which are such invariable accompaniments to anecdotes of European travel, nor the usual elated rebound into topics of local interest after a tribute to the miles I had traveled, in some such generalizing phrase of finality as, “Well, I suppose you enjoyed Europe as much as ever.”
If I had ever suffered from the enforced repression within my own soul of my various European experiences I was more than indemnified by the reception which awaited this last return to my native land. For I found myself set upon and required to give an account of what I had seen, not only by my family and friends, but by callers, by acquaintances in the streets, by friends of acquaintances, by letters from people I knew, and many from those whose names were unfamiliar.
The questions they all asked were of a striking similarity, and I grew weary in repeating the same answers, answers which, from the nature of the subject, could be neither categorical nor brief. How many evenings have I talked from the appearance of the coffee-cups till a very late bedtime, in answer to the demand, “Now, you’ve been to Rome; you’ve seen the Montessori schools. You saw a great deal of Dr. Montessori herself and were in close personal relations with her. Tell us all about it. Is it really so wonderful? Or is it just a fad? Is it true that the children are allowed do exactly as they please? I should think it would spoil them beyond endurance. Do they really learn to read and write so young? And isn’t it very bad for them to stimulate them so unnaturally? And....” this was a never-failing cry, “what is there in it for our children, situated as we are?”