Abstract/Notes: Cette bibliographie sans prétendre être exhaustive montre la densité croissante des recherches historiques sur Maria Montessori réalisées en Italie ces vingt dernières années. Il existe parmi nos collègues transalpins un réseau de chercheurs en la matière où les pionniers : Clara Tornar, Giacomo Cives et Paola Trabalzini, entraînent à leur suite une pléiade de chercheurs comme Fulvio De Giorgi, Renato Foschi, Tiziana Pironi ou Erica Moretti. D’où la variété des travaux qui laissent de moins en moins de zones d’ombre dans l’œuvre de la pédagogue et dans son action. La formation de Maria Montessori imprégnée du positivisme scientifique ambiant, ses liens, parfois contradictoires, avec l’Église catholique, la théosophie et la maçonnerie, son engagement social aux côtés des féministes et des enfants des classes pauvres, ses rapports à la psychanalyse, ses relations ambigües avec le pouvoir y compris fasciste, etc. sont passés au peigne fin. Cependant, tout n’est pas encore exploré concernant Maria Montessori et, surtout, le mouvement qu’elle a fondé. Les enfants qui bénéficièrent de la pédagogie montessorienne et leur devenir scolaire restent sous-étudiés, ainsi que la place du montessorisme dans l’école publique, question sensible pour les Français. Mais le travail de nos collègues italiens a largement ouvert la voie... [This bibliography, without claiming to be exhaustive, shows the increasing density of historical research on Maria Montessori carried out in Italy over the past twenty years. Among our transalpine colleagues there is a network of researchers in the field where the pioneers: Clara Tornar, Giacomo Cives and Paola Trabalzini, lead a host of researchers like Fulvio De Giorgi, Renato Foschi, Tiziana Pironi or Erica Moretti. Hence the variety of work that leaves less and less gray areas in the work of the pedagogue and in his action. Maria Montessori's training, steeped in the prevailing scientific positivism, her links, sometimes contradictory, with the Catholic Church, theosophy and Masonry, her social commitment alongside feminists and children from the poor classes, her relationship to psychoanalysis, her ambiguous relations with power, including fascists, etc. have been combed through. However, not everything has yet been explored concerning Maria Montessori and, above all, the movement she founded. The children who benefited from Montessorian pedagogy and their future at school remain under-studied, as well as the place of Montessorism in public schools, a sensitive issue for the French. But the work of our Italian colleagues has largely paved the way...]

Language: French

DOI: 10.3917/etsoc.175.0201

ISSN: 0014-2204

Abstract/Notes: "The Government of Italy have decided to create a special Chair for the world famous educationist, Dr. Maria Montessori, at the University of Perugia, for psychological research, according to information received by the Bombay Branch of the Association Montessori Internationale."

Language: English

Language: English

ISSN: 0519-0959

Language: English

ISSN: 0519-0959

Language: English

ISSN: 0519-0959

Abstract/Notes: This chapter investigates the birth and evolution of Maria Montessori's approach in Italy, from the turn of the twentieth century to the present. It delves into the different schools of thought that either supported or hindered the diffusion of her methodology, weaving private correspondence, governmental reports, and pedagogical writing to understand the complex relationship between the Italian educator and her native country. It also traces the trajectory of Montessori's student population in Italy, from its humble origins in an economically disadvantaged neighborhood of Rome to mostly private Italian Montessori institutions today.

Language: English

Published: New York, New York: Bloomsbury Academic, 2023

ISBN: 978-1-350-27561-4 978-1-350-27560-7 978-1-350-27562-1

Series: Bloomsbury Handbooks

Language: English

ISSN: 0519-0959

Language: English

ISSN: 0002-8304

Abstract/Notes: Montessori is historically recognized for her contributions to early education. Her primary recognition derived from the comprehensive educational program which became known as the Montessori Method. Relatively little attention has focused on her background as physician, psychiatrist, and pedagogical psychologist, from which she developed a body of psychological knowledge which established the foundation of the well-known Method. Her pedagogical psychology was overshadowed by her pedagogical theory despite her secure position in the history of child psychiatry. Also contributing to the non-acceptance of Montessori's psychology was the psychological tenor of the times. In the forefront of the psychological movement in the early 1900's were psychometric testing, Freud's psycho-sexual stages, Thorndike's stimulus-response theory, and the emergence of behaviorism under the leadership of Watson, to name a few. This climate was not hospitable to Montessori's developmental-interactionist theory. In the 1960's through the research findings of psychologists and the availability of Federal funds to compensate the "cumulative deficits" of the disadvantaged child, interest was focused on early childhood education and consequently the Montessori Method. As psychologists embraced Piaget's developmental theory, resemblances in thinking between Piaget and Montessori were noted. While psychologists pointed to Montessori's developmental-interactionist ideas, nobody attempted to elaborate her developmental theory in toto. This study attempts to do so. For Montessori, the development of the child takes place in successive and qualitatively different stages, with each stage providing the foundation for succeeding stages. Within this framework, she clearly delineates cognitive, motor, language, socialization, personality, and character as developing through stages. Cognitive structures develop through the child's interaction with, and actions upon, objects in the environment. A thorough examination of her theory leaves no doubt that Montessori is a cognitive developmentalist. While at times she appears nativistic, and at other times an extreme environmentalist, her position on development is interactionist and constructivist. Montessori is historically recognized for her contributions to early education. Her primary recognition derived from the comprehensive educational program which became known as the Montessori Method. Relatively little attention has focused on her background as physician, psychiatrist, and pedagogical psychologist, from which she developed a body of psychological knowledge which established the foundation of the well-known Method. Her pedagogical psychology was overshadowed by her pedagogical theory despite her secure position in the history of child psychiatry. Also contributing to the non-acceptance of Montessori's psychology was the psychological tenor of the times. In the forefront of the psychological movement in the early 1900's were psychometric testing, Freud's psycho-sexual stages, Thorndike's stimulus-response theory, and the emergence of behaviorism under the leadership of Watson, to name a few. This climate was not hospitable to Montessori's developmental-interactionist theory. In the 1960's through the research findings of psychologists and the availability of Federal funds to compensate the "cumulative deficits" of the disadvantaged child, interest was focused on early childhood education and consequently the Montessori Method. As psychologists embraced Piaget's developmental theory, resemblances in thinking between Piaget and Montessori were noted. While psychologists pointed to Montessori's developmental-interactionist ideas, nobody attempted to elaborate her developmental theory in toto. This study attempts to do so. For Montessori, the development of the child takes place in successive and qualitatively different stages, with each stage providing the foundation for succeeding stages. Within this framework, she clearly delineates cognitive, motor, language, socialization, personality, and character as developing through stages. Cognitive structures develop through the child's interaction with, and actions upon, objects in the environment. A thorough examination of her theory leaves no doubt that Montessori is a cognitive developmentalist. While at times she appears nativistic, and at other times an extreme environmentalist, her position on development is interactionist and constructivist. In contemporary terms her "psychopedagogy" would be considered an action psychology, which basically precludes it from academic "respectibility". Her theory contains both strengths and weaknesses in light of present-day thinking; however, on balance, Montessori's theory is quite contemporary and remarkably ahead of most of the psychological thinking of her time.

Language: English

Published: New York City, New York, 1982

Abstract/Notes: This dissertation explores the evolution of Italian Fascist ideas of racial identity between 1923 and 1940 and contends that those ideas led to some of the most significant Fascist policies, such as the invasion of Ethiopia and the passage of the 1938 racial laws. Common belief holds that racism played no role in the doctrine of Benito Mussolini's government. On the contrary, from the very beginning of their regime, Fascists worked to infuse the Italian population with concrete conceptions of their national identity—their italianità—and its superiority over all others. The education of Italian children vividly illustrates the racial project at the heart of Fascist doctrine. One of the regime's earliest priorities was to restructure the national education system in order to more effectively inform the population of the ideals of the new Fascist order. The administration centralized the existing infrastructure and founded the new institutions of the National Organization for the Protection of Mothers and Children (ONMI) and the National Balilla Organization (ONB). Thus, the state embraced all aspects of the young Italian's life, from the cradle to school, on the weekends and during summer vacations. Contemporary textbooks, teaching manuals, pedagogical journals, and government documents reveal an early and lasting commitment to instilling Italy's youngest generations with a collective identity based upon inherited historical, cultural, and spiritual characteristics that resulted in a belief in racial entitlement. As the regime solidified its power, it initiated further changes to the education system with the goal of turning children into ideal Fascists. As it militarized the population and sent Italians to civilize foreign lands, officials created a more direct language that mobilized the nation's youth to protect the fatherland against its enemies. Such a curriculum was unavoidably racist in content, and when Mussolini legalized discrimination against 'non-Italians' in 1938, the pre-existing pedagogy allowed for a relatively smooth transition between pre-racial-law education and post-racial-law education. When Italy entered World War II in 1940, the values were set for Italians to wage a war for national pride and racial privilege.

Language: English

Published: New Haven, Connecticut, 2010