This interest led her to the pioneering work of Dr. Itard and Seguin, who stressed the concrete and the sensory. She received permission to open a school for retarded children, based on Itard's and Seguin's approach. Eventually her methods spread to other parts of Europe and the United States. Maria Montessori was as much a student of children as she was a teacher. She recognized that the child's only valid impulse to learning was self-motivation.
Children move themselves towards learning.
The teacher prepares the environment, directs activities, functions as the catalytic agent or leader, and offers the child stimulation and guidance. But it is the child who learns, who is motivated through the work itself to persist in a given task. Underlying it all was was her belief in the dignity and spiritual worth of the child. She also wrote 20 more books and pamphlets and in 1948 was nominated for the Nobel Peace Prize for her work towards education for peace. Maria Montessori died in 1952, in Noorkwijk, Netherlands and was buried there.