Maria Montessori - The Montessori Method - Scientific Pedagogy as Applied to Child Education

DR. MONTESSORI GIVING A LESSON IN TOUCHING GEOMETRICAL INSETS

TRANSLATED BY ANNE E. GEORGE

I place at the beginning of this volume, now appearing in the United States, her fatherland, the dear name of

ALICE HALLGARTEN

of New York, who by her marriage to Baron Leopold Franchetti became by choice our compatriot.

Ever a firm believer in the principles underlying the Case dei Bambini, she, with her husband, forwarded the publication of this book in Italy, and, throughout the last years of her short life, greatly desired the English translation which should introduce to the land of her birth the work so near her heart.

To her memory I dedicate this book, whose pages, like an ever-living flower, perpetuate the recollection of her beneficence.

Grateful acknowledgment is made to Mrs. Guy Baring, of London, for the loan of her manuscript translation of "Pedagogia Scientifica"; to Mrs. John R. Fisher (Dorothy Canfield) for translating a large part of the new work written by Dr. Montessori for the American Edition; and to The House of Childhood, Inc., New York, for use of the illustrations of the didactic apparatus. Dr. Montessori's patent rights in the apparatus are controlled, for the United States and Canada, by The House of Childhood, Inc.

The Publishers.

In February, 1911, Professor Henry W. Holmes, of the Division of Education of Harvard University, did me the honour to suggest that an English translation be made of my Italian volume, " Il Metodo della Pedagogia Scientifica applicato all' educazione infantile nelle Case dei Bambini ." This suggestion represented one of the greatest events in the history of my educational work. To-day, that to which I then looked forward as an unusual privilege has become an accomplished fact.

The Italian edition of " Il Metodo della Pedagogia Scientifica " had no preface, because the book itself I consider nothing more than the preface to a more comprehensive work, the aim and extent of which it only indicates. For the educational method for children of from three to six years set forth here is but the earnest of a work that, developing the same principle and method, shall cover in a like manner the successive stages of education. Moreover, the method which obtains in the Case dei Bambini offers, it seems to me, an experimental field for the study of man, and promises, perhaps, the development of a science that shall disclose other secrets of nature.

In the period that has elapsed between the publication of the Italian and American editions, I have had, with my pupils, the opportunity to simplify and render more exact certain practical details of the method, and to gather additional observations concerning discipline. The results attest the vitality of the method and the necessity for an extended scientific collaboration in the near future, and are embodied in two new chapters written for the American edition. I know that my method has been widely spoken of in America, thanks to Mr. S. S. McClure, who has presented it through the pages of his well-known magazine. Indeed, many Americans have already come to Rome for the purpose of observing personally the practical application of the method in my little schools. If, encouraged by this movement, I may express a hope for the future, it is that my work in Rome shall become the centre of an efficient and helpful collaboration.

To the Harvard professors who have made my work known in America and to McClure's Magazine , a mere acknowledgment of what I owe them is a barren response; but it is my hope that the method itself, in its effect upon the children of America, may prove an adequate expression of my gratitude.

Maria Montessori.

Rome, 1912.