Teaching Peace: A Dialogue on Maria Montessori

Cheryl Lynn Duckworth, Nova Southeastern University

Abstract

Most educators are familiar with the principles of one of the founding mothers of peace education, Maria Montessori. Bringing an utterly fresh vision to notions of childhood and education, she re‐imagined the classroom as one in which children would explore and discover their own interests and passions. With regard to conflict resolution, she specifically stated that such an education made the continuation of man’s seemingly endless cycle of war and poverty more likely to continue: further, she argued that if education truly could develop ethically and socially conscious men and women, whose moral sense had been developed as fully as their ability to read and write, mankind could begin hoping for a more peaceful world. The following profiles of international Montessori schools should help clarify the processes an educational philosophy goes through when it is adopted by another culture—essential knowledge as education becomes increasingly global—as well as the contributions of today’s Montessori schools to the development of international‐mindedness in students and teachers alike.