HerStance: Legacy of Resilience
HerStance delves into the lives of extraordinary women who shaped our world, revealing their vital contributions to culture, industry, education, and art. We go beyond the history books to explore their challenges and triumphs, drawing parallels to current social issues. Each episode culminates in a practical 'HerStance Challenge,' empowering you to take action in your own community and join the movement for true equality. Join us to be inspired, informed, and part of a powerful legacy of change.
HerStance: Legacy of Resilience
Episode 13: Peace Begins Within: Lessons from Dr. Maria Montessori's Extraordinary Life
The remarkable journey of Dr. Maria Montessori reveals a woman who defied every boundary placed before her in 19th century Italy. This episode of HerStance explores how this determined pioneer transformed from a girl who wasn't considered exceptional in early grades to becoming one of Italy's first female physicians—facing hostility and harassment every step of the way.
Dr. Montessori's revolutionary educational method was born from her work with marginalized children in Rome's slums, where she created child-sized environments that put learning directly in children's hands. What began as an experiment with "practically feral" children blossomed into a global movement that continues to shape education across continents today. We trace her fascinating path from Italy to Spain to India, including her complex relationship with Mussolini and her eventual exile for refusing to compromise her beliefs about peace and education.
Beyond her educational innovations, Montessori developed a profound philosophy linking peace within individuals to peace in society. "Establishing lasting peace is the work of education. All politics can do is keep us out of war," she famously declared. Her vision resonates with ancient wisdom traditions and modern psychology that recognize the connection between inner harmony and outer peace. Join us for this captivating exploration of a truly revolutionary woman, and discover a special 30-day mindfulness challenge to help find your own inner peace. Ready to change your perspective? Subscribe, download the free worksheet from https://theleap.co/creator/herstance, and share your mindfulness journey with us!
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Welcome back to Her Stance. I'm your host, sandra Cayley, and I've got another great episode for you today. A true pioneer, a woman who had to fight to be in fields where women just weren't generally seen. She was a mathematician, a physician, a psychiatrist, a peace activist and a woman's rights advocate. She was born in Italy, lived and lectured in Spain, traveled and set up schools and trained teachers around the world, then died in the Netherlands. Who am I talking about? Maria Tecla Artemisia Montessori. Now, before we get into the deets of her story, let me remind you that you can see past episodes of Her Stance episodes 1 through 11, on YouTube at Her Stance. They are in video format and you will find courageous women there, like Eve and Mary Magdalene of the Christian Bible, medusa from Greek mythology and the real story of Pocahontas. So check those out and subscribe there. Now, at the end of each of our episodes is a Her Stance Challenge, so stick with me. Then go to my product store at theleapco slash creator, slash her stance for a free downloadable worksheet, to continue the fun and to sign up for my newsletter. Issue one is out this month. It offers great ways to be engaged in today's women's rights movement, so please subscribe, give me a rating, make a comment, share with your bestie. I appreciate it all. Now let's get back to our regularly scheduled programming.
Speaker 1:I'm pretty sure that most everyone has heard something about the Montessori method of early childhood education, but for those who may not quite know what it's about, here's a little primer. The Montessori method puts children in the driver's seat of their learning, with teachers acting as keen observers. It's all about creating a learning environment that's just right for a child's development. Plus, it emphasizes how much kids learn by being active and doing things, making abstract ideas and practical skills easier to understand. There are lots of learning opportunities throughout different activity centers in the room, outings to nature, chores that encourage problem solving. And it discourages competition and emphasizes collaboration and supporting one another. Now, that's the method. So who was this woman? Now that's the method. So who was this woman?
Speaker 1:Dr Montessori had an upbringing of challenges in the 19th century. She was born in 1870 in Chiaravalle, italy, a small town along the Adriatic Sea. Her father was an official of the Ministry of Finance, working in the local state-run tobacco factory. Her mother, renilda Stoppani, was well-educated for the times and was the niece of Italian geologist and paleontologist Antonio Stoppani. It was her mother who readily encouraged her, and although she had a loving relationship with her father, he disagreed with her choice to continue her education. She wasn't discouraged. Her father's work took the family to Florence and then Rome, which was probably fortuitous for her education. Probably fortuitous for her education. She wasn't considered exceptional in the early grades. But for so many of us women, we have to find the fire within ourselves to be seen and heard.
Speaker 1:At the age of 13, maria Montessori entered an all-boys secondary technical school, an all-boys secondary technical school, regia Scuola Tecnica Michelangelo Buonarti, where she studied Italian arithmetic, algebra, geometry, accounting, history, geography and sciences. She graduated in 1886 with good grades and examination results that year. At age 16, she continued at the Technical Institute Regio Istituto Tecnico Leonardo da Vinci, studying Italian, mathematics, history, geography, geometric and ornate drawing, physics, chemistry, botany, zoology and two foreign languages. I'm stressing here that this woman is an achiever right. She did well in the sciences and especially in mathematics. Initially, she intended to pursue the study of engineering upon graduation. Initially, she intended to pursue the study of engineering upon graduation, an unusual aspiration for women at the time.
Speaker 1:By the time she graduated in 1890, at the age of 20, with a certificate in physics, mathematics, she had decided to study medicine, a more unlikely pursuit given cultural norms at the time. Naturally, while highly qualified to enter the University of Rome Medical School, she met with much resistance, in fact hostility and harassment, because her attendance of classes with men in the presence of a naked body was deemed inappropriate. She was required to perform her dissections of cadavers alone after hours Prize in her first year, and in 1895, she secured a position as a hospital assistant, gaining early clinical experience. In her last two years she studied pediatrics and psychiatry and worked in the pediatric consulting room and emergency service. Becoming an expert in pediatric medicine, she graduated from the University of Rome in 1896 as a doctor of medicine. Her thesis was published in 1897. She found employment as an assistant at the university hospital and started a private practice, all of this by the age of 26. She worked with and researched children with cognitive delay, illness and disability, and she began to travel, study, speak and publish nationally and internationally, coming to prominence as an advocate for women's rights and education for children with learning difficulties.
Speaker 1:Her life took a little bit of a turn here when, in 1898, maria gave birth to a son, mario. She had had an affair with a fellow doctor. And here she had to make a difficult decision. If she married, she would be expected to stop working and be a full-time mother and homemaker. But as a driven woman with a passion for children's education and advancing other causes, she opted for her work in studies. She wanted to keep the relationship with her child's father secret, under the condition that neither of them would marry anyone else. But when the father of her child was pressured by family to make a more advantageous social connection and subsequently married, maria was left feeling betrayed and decided to leave the university hospital. She was forced to place her son in the care of a wet nurse living in the countryside, distraught to miss the first few years of his life. The good news here is that later she would be reunited with her son in his teenage years, where he proved to be a great assistant in her research.
Speaker 1:All this while she continued with her research at the University of Rome's psychiatric clinic in a voluntary position. Psychiatric clinic in a voluntary position. As part of her work, she visited asylums in Rome where she observed children with mental disabilities. These observations were fundamental to her future educational work. She studied and began to focus on children with learning disabilities. She felt that society had a responsibility for juvenile delinquency and she began speaking and writing on the subject, as well as urging the creation of special classes and institutions for children with learning difficulties, as well as teacher training for their instructors children with learning difficulties, as well as teacher training for their instructors. As she continued to study all types of psychology, education, anthropology, she began to adapt her methods of educating children with learning difficulties to mainstream education.
Speaker 1:Casa dei Bambini, the children's house, was conceived in 1906, and this was the incubator from which the first of her classrooms was developed. This is a crazy story. There was a failed housing experiment in Rome called Quartiere di San Lorenzo. In Rome called Quartiere di San Lorenzo, a large number of homeless had set themselves up in this abandoned structure, and it was known as the shame of Italy. Something had to be done, so the city governors decided to provide for a number of couples there, and to those couples there were about 50 children. They were practically feral and from among those they were given assistance. The families were given the parents were given jobs, they were given food, but the children needed daycare of some sort, they needed watching, and Maria Montessori was asked to look after them. So she set up a room where she started to observe them. She took notes, she swapped out adult-sized furniture for small children-sized tables and chairs, she made materials accessible on low shelves and she added activities that included daily personal care and household chores and options for freely selected creativity, and her method was born.
Speaker 1:By 1912, montessori schools had opened in Paris and many other Western European cities. Cities and more were planned for Argentina, australia, china, india, japan, korea, mexico, switzerland, syria, the United States and New Zealand. Public programs in London, johannesburg, rome and Stockholm had adopted the method in their school systems. Montessori societies were founded in the United States and the United Kingdom In 1913,. The first international training course was held in Rome, with a second in 1914. To say that it spread like wildfire is an understatement. Dr Maria Montessori's first students were children who were marginalized in their home city of Rome, lacking both socioeconomic and social privilege. Dr Montessori called her revolutionary mission for educational equality the pursuit of peace and justice, which became a cornerstone of the Montessori method. This is where life starts to get really interesting for Dr Montessori personally. Montessori personally.
Speaker 1:Maria Montessori believed that emphasizing peace in the social world of children would result in a generation of adults inclined to advocate for a more peaceful world. The historian Erica Moretti describes the process underpinning this vision in her book entitled the Best Weapon for Peace. She writes, achieving peace was a two-fold process. First, the child would be called to develop an internal peace, a harmony with the environment and a moral sense to guide her acts harmony with the environment and a moral sense to guide her acts. Second, having developed into a satisfied adult, she would be gratified by her own work and would be able to find a place within the larger ecology of the world. The resulting adult would have a natural propensity toward peace. She would find joy in her work and in her relationships with people. Of course, our world has never been a peaceful place, and the mid-20th century showed no mercy on Dr Montessori.
Speaker 1:In 1916, maria Montessori moved to Barcelona, spain. Maria Montessori moved to Barcelona, spain, and for the next two decades she traveled across Europe sharing her educational ideas. However, things got complicated around 1920 when the Catalan independence movement asked her to publicly support their cause. Montessori chose to remain neutral, which led to the withdrawal of official support for her programs. By 1924, a military dictatorship in Spain even closed her model school in Barcelona, causing Montessori education to decline there, though Barcelona remained her home for another 12 years. Interestingly, in 1933, under a new government, support for her work was re-established and she even published two books in Spanish. Sadly, the outbreak of the Spanish Civil War in 1936 forced her to leave Spain for good Around. The same time, in 1924, montessori found an unlikely ally in Benito Mussolini, who initially supported her educational approach as part of his national program. He even became the honorary president of the Montessori Society. But his partnership didn't last.
Speaker 1:By the 1930s, montessori's strong beliefs about peace and education clashed with the Italian government's agenda, leading to conflict over funding and ideology. Montessori's commitment to peace became increasingly central to her work. In 1932, she gave a significant speech on peace and education in France and continued to speak on this theme at international peace clubs and conferences throughout the 1930s. These ideas were later published in her book entitled Education and Peace. By 1932, both Montessori and her son Mario were under political surveillance in Italy. She eventually resigned from the Montessori Society in 1933 and left Italy in 1934. By 1936, the Italian government had completely shut down Montessori activities in the country. Her anti-fascist views ultimately led to her exile during Mussolini's rule. During this time she further developed her education for peace philosophy, emphasizing children as natural peacemakers and education as the key to ending war. She famously said establishing lasting peace is the work of education. All politics can do is keep us out of war.
Speaker 1:When World War II broke out and Italy joined Germany, the British interned Italians in the UK and its colonies. While her son, mario, was briefly interned, maria Montessori herself was confined to a Theosophical Society compound in India. They were later reunited and remained in India until 1946, continuing their work through lectures and courses. Until 1946, continuing their work through lectures and courses. In her later years, maria Montessori received numerous honors, including the French Legion of Honor and multiple Nobel Peace Prize nominations. She was also actively involved in the founding of the UNESCO Institute for Education in 1951, using her platform to advocate fiercely with inherent rights from birth, warning of the consequences of stifling their potential.
Speaker 1:Though Maria Montessori passed away in 1952 at the age of 81, her profound legacy continues to shape education around the world today, thousands of schools, millions of children influenced and educated by her methods. Organizations such as UNESCO continue to evolve programs to serve the world. Continued to evolve programs to serve the world. In 1999, they created the UNESCO Institute of Statistics, where you can see an impressive World Education Statistics report each year. The Montessori Public Policy Initiative, mppi, centers around policy change related to Montessori education. And then there are smaller, more localized efforts, such as Pathways Early Learning Center, which is a non-profit, tuition-free preschool that provides trauma-informed, montessori-inspired care to children who are experiencing homelessness. The list goes on. I'm sure Dr Montessori could not have imagined all of the Facebook groups discussing a Montessori education, or supplies and materials, teacher training, parents, helping parents, alums, you name it.
Speaker 1:Dr Montessori had a dream of peace in this world, starting with the social world of children. Psychologist and cognitive scientist Steven Pinker at Harvard University thinks it is completely conceivable that wars between countries might go the way of slave auctions, debtors' prisons and other barbaric customs. He says that we are predisposed to be violent, but we are also predisposed to be peaceful. There are some parts to the brain that impel us to carry out violence, such as the thirst for revenge, feelings of tribalism or the quest for dominance. But packed into the same skull, there are motives that inhibit us from violence, like empathy and reason, that allow us to see violence as a problem to be solved instead of a contest to be won. And this second part of the brain is what a Montessori education is capitalizing on Genuine world peace would mean effective consensus regarding shared sacrifices as well as voluntary cooperation.
Speaker 1:But you can't impose peace by a dominant power assisted by a few partners. And here's also a thought Capitalist sectors are designed to perpetuate violence and even the possibility of war. I mean, how hard was it to get everyone with nuclear weapons capabilities to agree to stand down on production and storing of those weapons or materials, pointing those things at each other with someone's finger on the button should a wrong word be uttered? Has the human race evolved? Well, yes and no. Early egalitarian groups had a high homicide rate. When there were conflicts, they tried to head them off before they started, without any alpha male leader to mediate or stop it. They went head to head, sort of like gang warfare, right In larger towns and cities. As they grew population dense, chiefdoms and kingdoms emerged, and then we had centralized powers for conflict management, police forces, and now, on a world stage, we have the United Nations.
Speaker 1:But it's not really working that well for us. Not everyone is allowed in. Not all members agree on how to use or pool resources. There are bullies in the room. If you don't bring people into the room who are peaceful, you won't bring about peace. I'm going to go out on a limb here and, in agreement with Maria Montessori, state that we need to raise a more peaceful generation, and one way is to add more Montessori aspects into the public education curriculum for a change in our nation or the world. The other is to bring more adults into a place of peace within themselves. Peace within themselves, that is, that we become acutely aware of where we are causing harm speaking in ways that cause unrest, thinking in ways that manifest violence against others or to ourselves.
Speaker 1:The ultimate proponent of inner peace, beginning outer peace, is the Buddha. 2600 years ago, he taught us that what we think we become and that peace comes from within. Additionally, he let us know that hatred does not cease by hatred, but only by love, does not cease by hatred, but only by love. But there are others that have come to this understanding as well. Wayne Dyer, a self-help American writer, has said If you don't have love, harmony and peace within you, then you can't contribute these qualities. I think we're seeing that right now in the United States.
Speaker 1:Eleanor Roosevelt said first of my own personal requirements is inner calm. This is, I think, an essential One of the secrets of using your time well is to gain a certain ability to maintain peace within yourself, so that much can go on around you and you can stay calm inside. Louise Hay, an American writer, said when you find peace within, you create a peaceful world around you. You create a peaceful world around you. Marvin Gaye, an American songwriter and performing artist, said If you cannot find peace within yourself, you will never find it anywhere else. Albert Einstein said Peace cannot be kept by force. It can only be achieved through understanding. Geshe Kelsang Gyatso, a Buddhist monk, said we all wish for world peace, but world peace will never be achieved unless we first establish peace within our own minds, will never be achieved unless we first establish peace within our own minds. And a woman named Peace Pilgrim, who originally was named Mildred Lisette Norman, said ultimate peace begins within. When we find peace within, there will be no more conflict, no more occasion for war. So that brings me to today's Hearst Dance Challenge. This challenge is to go inward.
Speaker 1:Mindfulness meditation was brought to the United States because of John Cabot Zinn, a professor of medication emeritus and creator of the Stress Reduction Clinic at the Center of Mindfulness in Medicine, healthcare and Society at the University of Massachusetts Medical School. He first learned about the philosophical tenets of Buddhism while studying at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology you heard me right, mit. In 1979, kabat-zinn opened the Stress Reduction Clinic at the University of Massachusetts Medical School, and there he adapted Buddhist teachings and created a program called Mindfulness-Based Stress Reduction, or MBSR. But it wasn't until 1990, when he published a book called Full Catastrophe Living. That brought global attention to his work, and since then, awareness and practice of mindfulness continued to grow. And then, in 2018, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, the CDC, reported that meditation was the fastest growing health trend in the United States.
Speaker 1:So what is mindfulness? Mindfulness involves paying attention to something in the moment, on purpose and with open curiosity. It could be sitting and paying attention to your breath. It can be taking a walk and being present to the bird song or your feet on the pavement, with each step the air on your face. It could be eating mindfully, feeling and tasting like really tasting each bite, feeling and tasting like really tasting each bite, and it's for everyone, from young to mature. No special equipment needed, just be here now. So here are some mindfulness exercises to consider, and then pop over to my store at theleapco slash creator, slash her stance and I'll put that in the notes the show notes to get your free download of these exercises and start with a practice for 30 days and see if you don't start to experience a shift in your attitude, in how your day goes and how you see the world. So the first of these exercises is meditation.
Speaker 1:Meditation is often synonymous with mindfulness, and mindful meditations can help you center yourself and regain control of your head space. There are many ways to meditate walking, sitting. You can use a chair. There's no tight lotus position required. You can use an app on your phone for some guided meditations, as little as 3, 5, 10 minutes a day. Try one of those apps and see what works.
Speaker 1:Another exercise is breathing. Breath work or mindful breathing can be a helpful and simple way to ease your mind. It involves slowing down and paying attention to your breath. That's it. Yoga. Yoga is one of the most common mindfulness practices. You may find that it helps you become more aware of your body and you move more mindfully. And finally, journaling. Journaling can help you become more mindful of your thoughts and feelings. You'll get to understand that your thoughts are not who you are, and thoughts observed just come and go. They aren't real. They're just perceptions. Journal prompts like How's my heart today can help you uncover your sense of self. Thanks for tuning in to Hearst Dance today. Don't forget to hit subscribe and leave a comment. Let me know how the next 30 days goes for you in practicing mindfulness. I'm already working on the next episode. I can't wait to be with you again in two weeks. Until then, I hope you find your inner peace. Thank you, thank you.
