On August 31, 1870, Maria Montessori was born in a small Italian town called Chiaravalle. As a girl she loved math so much that she carried her schoolbooks everywhere, even to the theatre. When she announced she wanted to be a doctor, people told her girls weren't allowed. She kept knocking on the university door anyway, and in 1896 she became one of the first women in Italy to earn a medical degree.
As a young doctor she worked with children other schools had given up on. Instead of making them sit still and copy off a blackboard, she watched what they actually did and built furniture their size, puzzles they could touch, and trays of beads they could pour. In 1907 she opened her first classroom, the Casa dei Bambini, in a poor neighborhood of Rome. Visitors were amazed: three-year-olds were quietly washing dishes, writing words with sandpaper letters, and choosing their own lessons. Word spread, and soon teachers from around the world were sailing to Italy to see this magic for themselves.
Today there are more than 20,000 Montessori schools all over the planet, from Tokyo to Toronto. Famous people who went to one include Jeff Bezos who started Amazon, Larry Page and Sergey Brin who started Google, and the chef Julia Child. Whenever a classroom has low shelves, child-sized chairs, and bins of hands-on materials kids can pick themselves, you can thank a curious Italian doctor who decided to actually listen to children.
