MONTESSORI | St. Anthony's School, London

Maria Montessori

November 15, 2020—My sister Sheila Marlin O'Neill was a Montessori-trained teacher who started several Montessori Schools and maintained them until her death. Her Montessori-trained children (fourth generation, since Hilda van Stockum's mother was also Montessori-trained) have continued one of the schools, at Garston Manor near Watford.

I have been interested in the chain of Montessori training. Sheila and Lis both went to Sion Hill in Blackrock, Dublin, where the Dominican Sisters used Montessori methods (see below). 

One of the trainings that Sheila took was at St. Anthony's School in London. Such a school exists (https://www.stanthonysprep.org.uk/about/our-history/) but it is not run by a religious order (it seems to have been owned by two different private equity firms in succession and is now owned by Alpha Plus).

Here is an excerpt from a book about Montessori Schools and training, which refers to Sister Stephanie, O.S.F. (Order of St Francis) as Headmistress of St. Anthony's School and is Honorary Secretary of the Catholic Montessori Guild. I would love to know more about her.

Maria Montessori believed that game-playing was at the heart of learning. It took a while for teachers in religious schools to get used to the idea that game-playing had a place in a  Catholic education. More here: https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/abs/10.1080/0034408800750308

Here is an explanation (from 2012!) why I am looking for Sister Stephanie and the story of St. Anthony's School: https://hildavanstockum.blogspot.com/2012/07/copy-of-missing-montessori-book.html.

I am also trying to contact the Council of Catholic Montessori Schools.

MOTHER'S DAY | An Appreciation for Hilda van Stockum

With Mom in 2005, when she was 97, the
year before her death.

May 10, 2020 (Mother's Day in the USA)—We celebrated Mother's Day today. That always-on-Sunday celebration was invented in the United States by Anna Jarvis. Her mother had held Mother's Friendship Days to reunite families and neighbors separated during the U.S. Civil War. Her daughter, Anna Jarvis, carried on the torch.

On May 10, 1908, the first official Mother's Day celebrations took place in the United States. That's also when three-month-old Hilda was on a boat with her parents to Java. (In 1914, Woodrow Wilson designated the second Sunday of May as Mother's Day.)

So, in a year when my Mom would have turned 112, our family's honoree today was Alice Tepper Marlin. Our daughter Caroline made a magnificent dinner for us to share. As we are hunkered down to avoid spread of the coronavirus, it was a good time for reflection.

Caroline with her Mom, Hachikō and John.
Artwork by Brigid Marlin. Photo by SL.

Alice and I remembered to each other our joint vivid experiences of our mothers in the past half-century (the 49th anniversary of our meeting was in March). Alice was especially grateful for our long vacations with the Marlin children and grandchildren: "Hilda and Spike organized the vacations so that the cousins would get to meet one another, form memories and bonds," she says. "Hilda favored the simpler life, self-reliance, home remedies for ailments, family time."

Caroline added: "She encouraged children to exercise their imagination. They were provided with writing and painting materials and they made things. They had performances."

In this time of "social distancing," when people must stay away from events and shopping where people congregate, we are thrown back on our own resources. The Marlin children, and then the grandchildren, had a chance to work on common vacation projects. I especially remember our vacations at Rosturk Castle in Mulranny, County Mayo, Ireland, especially as I have learned more about the man who had the idea for the castle, Colonel Vaughan, and started building it in 1867. He was from a one-time recusant Catholic family. Of the 13 Vaughan children who grew up in Courtfield, Ross, Herefordshire, six became priests and five became nuns. Another interesting vacation spot we spent summers in was Skibbereen, in southwest Ireland, when all the young cousins were thriving. Other memorable vacation homes were in Robin Hood, Maine; a vineyard villa in the hills outside of Florence; and a French chateau in la Ferté St Cyr.

Alice loved all these vacations. She missed out on big family gatherings in her childhood because her only sibling left home to go to Bryn Mawr College when Alice was eight. She also had an intellectually gifted mother, who went to Barnard College and then earned an advanced degree at  Columbia University. Alice's mother was a scientist. She chose the Baldwin School for Alice after much research, and instilled in Alice a respect for learning, especially science.

Mom's skillful understanding of what children need probably originated from her own mother, who was sent scads of instructions by her own Irish mother when she brought HvS to the East Indies when she was a few months old. HvS had six children to practice on, and was trained by Maria Montessori, who established a training center in Dublin. Mom was very proud of the book she did for Montessori course, and told me several times how much she misses having the book she did as part of the course. She thinks she loaned it to someone connected with a Sisters of Loreta convent in Dublin and somehow it was never returned. We have a bad copy of the book, and would dearly love to get back the original to republish it.

I intend to keep writing more about HvS, and her Dutch-Irish mother (Olga Boissevain), and her Irish mother (Emily Heloise MacDonnell). My niece Christine Schintgen would like to do a biography of HvS as a literary lion in the children's book field. I would like to focus on Hilda van Stockum as a correspondent with and about her family during World War II.

Maria Montessori's birthday

Dr. Maria Montessori, 1870-1952

Happy Birthday, Maria Montessori

I and my five Marlin siblings, born 1934-1945 and all living, were brought up largely by my mother (Hilda van Stockum) and grandmother (Olga Boissevain) until we went away to school. 

Both of them were trained directly by Dr. Montessori, so in a way the family was a mini-Montessori Pre-School.

My sister Sheila O'Neill for decades has headed up several  Montessori Schools in the UK, notably High Elms Manor School.

I am reminded today by Lake Wobegon's Garrison Keillor, in his daily newsletter, that it is her birthday.

Here is what he says about her.

John

It's the birthday of Maria Montessori (books by this author), born on this day in Chiaravalle, Italy (1870). She was a bright student, and she wanted to study engineering. So when she was 13, against her father's wishes, she entered a technical school, where all her classmates were boys. After a few years, she decided to pursue medicine, and she became the first woman in Italy to earn an M.D. degree.  As a doctor, she worked with children with special needs. And through her work with them, she became increasingly interested in education. She believed that children were not blank slates, but that they each had inherent, individual gifts. It was a teacher's job to help children find these gifts, rather than dictating what a child should know. She emphasized independence, self-directed learning, and learning from peers. Children were encouraged to make decisions. During World War II, Montessori was exiled from Italy because she was opposed to Mussolini's fascism and his desire to make her a figurehead for the Italian government. She lived and worked in India for many years, and then in Holland. She died in 1952 at the age of 81. She wrote many books about her philosophy of education, including The Montessori Method (1912) and The Absorbent Mind (1949).

MONTESSORI | Missing Book Discovered (Postscript November 15, 2020)

Maria Montessori

July 11, 2012—My mother, Hilda van Stockum, often spoke about Maria Montessori and the course she took with her, I believe in Dublin, Ireland. Her mother Olga Boissevain van Stockum was also Montessori-trained. My sister Sheila O'Neill heads up a Montessori school at High Elms in Garston, near Watford, UK, and all four of her daughters are trained Montessori teachers.

One of the things HvS did as part of her Montessori training was prepare a curriculum book. This was a labor of love for my mother and Mrs. Montessori was — my mother told me — very impressed with it. HvS told me she loaned it to a nun who was interested in the Montessori method and it was never returned. This was a big loss to her.

As HvS's executor, I have been hunting for this book in order to reprint it for use in Montessori schools and and for perusal by those interested in the history and practice of the Montessori method. Recently some Montessori School files were cleaned out in London and a copy of the missing book was retrieved — a long and interesting story that got the information to me via someone in Nairobi — and I therefore now have it,

However, I am still trying to track down the original book, because the copy is in black and white whereas the original was in color.

P.S. November 15, 2020—Reviewing comments from emails over the past year, I read that John Pine was given a copy (or the original?) of the manuscript by Sister Stephanie, OSF (Order of St. Francis), headmistress of St. Anthony's. The school seems to have closed and the name and real estate (?) was sold to a private equity firm that created another school in its place. I am still trying to track down the manuscript.