Little Things

As educators, parents, Montessorians, and just as human beings, our days are filled with little things.  Small, nearly insignificant things in and of themselves fill our lives.  Day after day, month after month, year after year, minor tasks, seemingly inconsequential chores, and fine details distract, absorb and drain.   Sometimes I wonder if they really matter at all.

Little things, like writing a short essay about little things, cause me to pause and wonder what difference does all this really make.

Montessori teaching days are filled with little things. How we work to get every item correctly organized in the correct place on the correct shelf in the correct area.  As I teacher, I recall the disappointment I felt if the knobbed cylinders were in the wrong order, if there wasn’t any paper for the metal inserts, or when class started with the stamps for the stamp game all mixed up. I recall struggling over the meticulous write-ups in my handbook, working to always know which hand (even which digit) is where. It isn’t easy to admit that sometimes I used only one finger on the sandpaper letters, or that I have lost track of what my subdominant hand was up to.

What care we take on every verbal and nonverbal message we send to the little ones. I know I have lost my “patience,” intervened too early, zipped that coat without asking, and succumbed to the temptation to praise a child with a “great job,” who has just done that old “Cam, watch this,  Cam watch this” on the monkey bars. 

Details, details details….

Montessori education is filled with them. Each day with children is filled with little things.

Yet it is from those little things, those minuscule, nearly insignificant things in of themselves, that the real Montessori message comes through. The real news from our rooms doesn’t come from expensive flashy materials, the brand-new computer, the fancy field trip, the elaborate shows and celebrations or special visitors, units of study or big group projects.

When Paul tied his shoe the other day, even if it took him 6 tries, that was a little thing. When Eileen concentrated the whole session on one project until she got that hamster home completely cleaned, refurbished and back in order, that was a little thing. When Casey finally chose some work to do without any help or suggestions, that was a little thing. When Kari realized and then demonstrated that she could read all the names on the class list, that was a little thing. When Tony asked to use the play dough instead of grabbing it, that was a little thing. And when Rachel actually said yes, that too was a little thing.

Maybe some little things are bigger than others.

Those are the little things that matter most. These are the things I am most grateful to be part of (even if it is only a little part). These tiny, quiet triumphs, one child by one child, that happen so often hidden in the hum of a bustling classroom, in a noisy building, in a busy city, in a big country, in a huge and mixed-up world, help me remember why all those details matter.

So, when we get back to work, and we’re all caught up in the details of the environment, keeping records, monitoring ourselves, writing reports, maintaining order, and whatever the little things are that bury us, remember to attend also to those little big things. They are what it is all about.

Larry Schaefer

Minnesota has lost one of our most effective and well-loved educators and Montessori pioneers, Larry Schaefer, who passed away last month.

Larry Schaefer, a co-founder of Lake Country School, died at 12:30am on September 29th. His wife (and Lake country co-founder) Pat Schaefer and all of his children were able to be with him. He was 91 years old.

Lake Country School was founded by Larry and his spouse, Pat Schaefer as an urban Montessori school in June 1976, It was the first Montessori school in Minnesota to offer a program for 9 to 12-year-olds and the first to offer a Montessori junior high program. The school began with seventy-two students in the school building at the Basilica of St. Mary in downtown Minneapolis. In 1980 the school moved to its present location, initially renting the school building from Incarnation Parish. The property was purchased in 1986 as the permanent home for Lake Country School.

In 1996 Pat and Larry Schaefer, co-principals of Lake Country School, retired after two decades of leadership.

Larry also worked to help start a secondary-level program that is now operating as is a Montessori charter school in Saint Paul, Minnesota. It functions as a primary, junior high, and high school, serving 1st through 12th graders.

More recently he authored and published Creating a Real School: Lake Country School Montessori Environments 1976-1996. In the book, Larry and Pat Schaefer describe the creation of Lake Country School and the first twenty years of its development. It begins in Bergamo, Italy, where the Schaefers took Montessori training courses; then to an established Montessori school in Toronto where they practiced for a few years; and finally to the Twin Cities, where they worked with a community of parents, students, educators, and benefactors to establish a school based on the pedagogical principles of Maria Montessori.

As a younger Montessorian I always looked up to, and was a little intimated by Larry. He was deeply thoughtful and highly intellectual and was a wonderful role model to me, as I worked to apply Montessori principles in my work.  So, I was especially honored when Larry asked me to read a draft of the book before it was published to provide a quote for the back of the book, which I was delighted to do.  

You can learn more about Larry and Lake Country School at https://www.lakecountryschool.org/apps/pages/index.jsp?uREC_ID=2050472&type=d&pREC_ID=2119014

Here is his Obituary

Lawrence Vincent Schaefer
 Born July 3, 1931, Died September 29, 2022.

Larry Schaefer passed away peacefully on September 29, 2022, at United Hospital.  He lived 91 years (was in his “92nd year” as he lovingly told his family), and words can’t fully describe his remarkable life and impact on others.  

Larry was an educator, historian, humanist, visionary and, in the words of his granddaughter Linnea, “the happiest person in the world.”  He achieved this happiness, and maintained it through his long, yet somehow too short, life because he combined an unmatched curiosity and intellect with a capacity to give and receive love that grew throughout his life and that he properly understood would never stop growing, even after death.  

Larry’s professional accomplishments as an educator are far too numerous to catalog, but include founding Lake Country School with his wife of 62 years, Pat Schaefer, which is and will remain a model and influential Montessori learning environment for children ages 2-14, in South Minneapolis.  He was the one of the visionaries and founders of Great River School, a Montessori Elementary, Junior High and High School in Saint Paul.  He earned a PhD and MA in history from Fordham University, as well as BA and MA in education from Fairfield University.  He served in the US Navy as an officer from 1955-1958. 

Larry became an influential global leader in Montessori education and devoted his professional life, which extended to the day he passed, to Montessori education and, in particular, the unique needs and potential of the adolescent.  His reach and influence extends throughout the world, as he taught and lectured throughout North America, Europe, Asia, Africa, New Zealand, and Australia.  His legacy in Montessori education will endure and lives on in the hearts and minds of thousands of educators and students he taught, mentored, and inspired.

Larry’s calling as a husband, father, grandfather, and family man, however, was perhaps more important to him than being a world-renowned teacher, writer and lecturer.  In 1961, his wife, Pat, challenged Larry to be a “Montessori father” after their first child Anne was born, and he embraced this challenge and was guided by it throughout his life as a family man.  To describe him as succeeding in this role is a vast understatement.

His legacy as the loving patriarch of the Schaefer family will echo for many generations.  Larry is survived by his wife, Patricia (née Scallen); sister Elizabeth Wicke; sister-in-law Lee Schaefer; children Anne (Jack) Wussler, Lawrence P. Schaefer (Toni Halleen), Mary (Bern) Enright,  Kris Schaefer (Kristen Brown), and “adopted” son Dick Senese.  Further survived by his beloved grandchildren Connor (Alia), Tom, Branch (KT), Beth, Linnea, Stella, Georgia, and Jesse  Larry was preceded in death by his beloved parents, William and Loretta Schaefer, and his cherished sister Marie and brothers Bill and Charlie..

Visitation Thursday, October 20 from 4:00 to 7:00 pm at Roseville Memorial Chapel (2245 N. Hamline Ave, Roseville). Funeral Mass at 10 am on Friday, October 21 at the Basilica of St. Mary (88 N 17th St, Mpls), with additional visitation at 9 am. The family asks that all attending take appropriate COVID precautions, wear a mask, be vaccinated, test as needed, and join via the livestream,  https://mary.online.church if feeling unwell.

In lieu of flowers, In lieu of flowers, donations can be sent to the Lake Country Land School at www.lakecountryschool.org.    

Welcome

My first experience with Montessori education was as a new assistant thrust into a Montessori environment with little more than a few preconceived notions to guide me. In time I became a Montessori teacher with my own classroom, responsible for the training and supervision of assistants and for working with resource teachers, parents and support staff—all of whom had notions of their own and little, if any, Montessori experience themselves.

I am also a parent. All my sons and daughters were enrolled in a variety of Montessori schools including one of the first Montessori public schools in Minnesota. As both a parent and a teacher I have been part of public and private Montessori school communities struggling to maintain integrity and consistency with administrators and staff from a variety of backgrounds not always familiar with Montessori.

Throughout the past, I have experienced how Montessorians our­selves sometimes create barriers. Too often we keep out our most important allies—parents, administrators, assistants, support staff and resource teachers. Through our special, often isolated, teacher preparation programs, and through the Montessori mystique we create, we alienate others. Through the richly metaphori­cal and unique terminology we use and through our preoccupation with the classroom, “Montessori” literature and colleagues, and the children for whom we work, we risk building walls around us and excluding others.

In my roles of assistant, classroom teacher, resource teacher, parent and administrator I have felt the need for a tool to help introduce people to Montessori history, philosophy and practice.

The book, Together with Montessori, is intended to be such a tool.

I hope that, as a tool, my book will help open the doors to the world of Montessori education to a wide variety of people. It is written for par­ents and staff in public and private schools throughout North America so that they may better work together for themselves and the children in their schools.

A tool serves no worthy purpose unless it is used well. I recommend that Montessori certified and non-certified personnel both become familiar with this book and that they use it as part of a larger orientation program that includes the demonstration of materials, observations in Montessori environments and dis­cussions. I hope that it is used as a reference to find out about areas that interest you, as a background, and as a starting place from which to form questions for your observations, for your colleagues and for future readings. Most importantly, I hope that you use it in a way that works for you.

As you do, be advised that the book, this website and my blog, represent my own interpretation of what I have been exposed to and my own choices about what to emphasize and what to exclude. The choices have been very difficult and I have done my best to base them on accepted and tested Montessori theory and practice. I encourage you to find out what others think. Consult and learn from the Montessorians in your midst. Read the writings of Maria Montessori. Read the works of others as well.

Something or someone has brought you to the Montessori educational approach. I hope this is the beginning of a fruitful journey.