SUSAN MAYCLIN STEPHENSON
Educator and Artist, Trinidad, California

Traveling the world for more than 40 years I continue to learn, and love to share insights
and experiences of work as a Montessori consultant and an artist. I hope you enjoy this page.

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Michael Olaf Montessori has supported this work for 30 years: home page; Montessori shop

5x7 cards with images of the paintings in the covers of the Michael Olaf catalogs are now available: cards

For our family holiday greetings we have written a song, "A Christmas Prayer for the Earth" and combined it with pictures that I have taken during Montessori work in Bhutan, Holland, India, Israel, Nepal, Palestine, Russia, Sikkim, Sweden, Thailand, Tibet and the USA. You can see, and share, the slide show and music here Prayer for the Earth

Read about the conference in Sikkim, Northern India, Science, Spirituality, and Education, a meeting of the Dalai Lama, scientists, philosophers, and educators including 5 of us Montessorians. Sikkim

This painting was made from photographs I took of the Dalai Lama in Sikkim, and others in books and magazines.

While consulting the the Montessori School of Moscow I happened upon a Russian Orthodox baptism which inspired this painting. I also visited a wonderful program in St. Petersburg for children with physical disabilities: Russia

Even if you do not read Russian, your students/children will enjoy looking at the Russian script on this Montessori language chart: chart

In 2003, for my 60th birthday, I traveled through Tibet, ending at the school for the blind in Lhasa. The paintings to the right are of (1) an old woman waiting for someone to unlock the door to Milarepa's cave so she could turn the prayer wheel, (2) The Tashilhunpo Monastery, (3) The Summer Palace in Lhasa.

Read details and about the school for the blind in Lhasa, here: Tibet

For the last 28 years this work has been supported by Michael Olaf Montessori Company, customers and friends.

The painting to the left is Michael Olaf holding his nephew Tai. My focus in the last years has been the development of the human being in the most powerful and influential first three years of life 0-3 years

To help bring good Montessori education to Bhutan I visited three times. The picture to the left is from photographs I was allowed to take in a class for young monks. Read about these trips, and the establishment of the first real Montessori class in many years here: Bhutan

In 2002 and 2005 I studied Buddhism in Dharamsala, India, and gave talks to the Montessori teachers at the Tibetan Children's Village: TCV Children's Village page: TCV home page

These pictures. (1) a Child practicing bows or prostrations, imitating adults doing the same during a teaching by the Dalai Lama, (2) The young son of a friend, making monasteries of Russian dolls I brought him, (3) a newly arrived (from Tibet) young Tibetan woman learning the craft of weaving carpets.

The painting: cremation ghats on the Bagmati River in Kathmandu. While helping a Montessori teacher I spent a week helping poor Bhotia children at the Sri Mangel Dvip boarding school. This year 2 of the SMD teachers will begin Montessori training! Pictures and links from the boarding school here SMD

In 2006 the first AMI Montessori 3-6 training began in Thailand and I was on the staff. This year there are 200 people being trained as teachers! This painting is from pictures taken while visiting a student's home at a Buddhist self-sustaining community. Here are some pictures from that first course, and a link to find out what is happening now: Thailand

After many years of teaching children from 2-13 in Montessori classes, I respected out youngest child's desire to homeschool. The painting to the left is during that time. Michael is now a lawyer and musician. To read a brief account of his homeschooling memories, see this page:
Montessori homeschooling

Since my first trip in 1963, I have wanted to to something to help children in the Middle East. For more information from this trip see:
Montessori in the Middle East

I have not painted from this area yet; the picture to the left is from a visit to a village school this spring, 2011.

EDUCATOR

NEWS: The latest Michael Olaf Montessori Newsletter, this time on "Grace and Courtesy," is just out. See it here: Manners

I have traveled in more than 70 countries, constantly learning about culture and education in the world. Working in other countries provides a valuable perspective on education, specifically Montessori education, and an understanding of the meaning of life. I have consulted in a variety of countries including the USA, India, New Zealand, Thailand, Nepal, The Bahamas, Bhutan, Peru, Albania, The Netherlands, and Russia.

Undergraduate studies: Denison University (Granville, Ohio), Indiana University (Bloomington, Indiana), The Semester at Sea program (University of Virginia; previously knows as "The University of the Seven Seas" a shipboard study/travel trip around the world, Europe, Africa, the Middle East, Asia), De Pauw University School of Music (Bay View Music Festival, Petoskey, Michigan), Alliance Francaise (Paris, France), San Francisco State University (San Francisco, California, double degree, Philosophy and Comparative Religion, 1969)
Graduate or extension courses: San Francisco State University, The California Institute of Integral Studies (San Francisco, previously known as The California Institute of Asian Studies), University of the Virgin Islands (USVI, St. Croix), The Berkeley Psychic Institute (Berkeley, CA), University of California (Berkeley, CA), Loyola College in Baltimore (degree 1996, Harvard Graduate School of Education (Cambridge, Massachusetts)
Degrees: BA, Philosophy; MA, Education
Post-graduate diplomas: AMI (Association Montessori Internationale) diplomas for three levels:
Birth to three (TMI, Denver, Colorado, and Rome Italy, 1991-1992)
Age 2-7 (MMI, London, England, 1970-1971)
Age 6-12+ (WMI, Washington, DC, 1976-1977)
My Montessori teachers and lecturers included Mario Montessori, Mario Montessori, Jr., Renilde Montessori, and several others trained by Dr. Maria Montessori.

SOME FAVORITE PAGES:
International Children's Projects

Birth to Three child:
Mindfulness from birth development video clips

susanonly@earthlink.net

CONSULTANT & SPEAKER

Dear Susan
Your experiences of working in so many diverse environments and with all age groups gives you a depth of knowledge that is rare to find. You build on the experiences of the people and the environment that exist, focusing on their strengths and not making them feel their weaknesses are failures. Your suggestions do not feel like criticism; you have a unique way in passing on direction in a very supportive way.
At 2 Voices we have felt that your suggestions have made a big difference already as we slowly work towards the goals we set. Some of your suggestions were small details but they have had a big effect. It was a fresh eye coming into the working environment that gave the already hard working teachers a boost and stimulation to go further. Susan, you have a keen eye for what is disrupting the environment and your solutions were clear, simple and, most importantly, easy to apply. Thank you!!
—Heidi Philappart, 2 Voices Montessori School, Amsterdam, Netherlands

Dear Susan,
From all of us here in Moscow we would like to thank you for the work that you have done! I am so happy to know you and we all feel that this is a beginning of a new friendship and we do think we'll meet again soon! One teacher says they all felt extremely enlightened, as if they all came out of a church!
I've been hearing more comments about your lecture and how people were happy to be able to ask questions and get their answers —both parents and teachers from other Montessori schools told me that.
—Valentina Zaytseva, Moscow

Beyond traditional education I am thankful for many opportunities: Music: Suzuki violin and piano studies, and master classes given by Dr. Suzuki and others at the Suzuki Talent Education Institute in Matsumoto, Japan. At their request I spoke on Montessori at an International Suzuki conference.
The Mind: a course on Multiple Intelligences, taught by Howard Gardner, at The Harvard Graduate School of Education. Art: a visit to the Reggio Emilia program in Italy. I have taught students from birth through college, worked as a counselor for juvenile delinquents and as a school administrator.

ARTIST

A thing of beauty is a joy for ever:
Its loveliness increases; it will never pass into nothingness.
—John Keats

It is only with the heart that one can see clearly.
—Antoine de Saint-Exupéry

Much of Susan's art is inspired during her work as an international consultant supporting the use of Montessori philosophy and practice in a variety of ways.

Susan has studied art in some form or another since 1960. During her travels she sketches and photographs the people and scenes that inspire her the most, and upon her return combines them with her own memories, creating oil paintings in order to share her experiences with others. She haunts art museums wherever she goes, at times arranging travel around specific art shows, especially of the impressionists and post impressionists. In order to carefully learn from the great masters she sometimes paints studies of their work.

She has taught art appreciation and studio arts. Her work hangs in a variety of places including Moscow, Albania, Japan, Palestine, Australia, Thailand, Italy, Colombia, and Sweden, and throughout the USA.

In April, 2008, I gave the first public Montessori lecture in Tirana, Albania to the heads of government, and celebrated the opening of the first Montessori school in Albania. On the way home she was hosted in Italy by two art patrons who have her oil paintings hanging in their lovely home in Rome. I was taken to see the art of Giotto in the Upper Church in Assisi, to the Uffizi Gallery in Florence, and to experience religious art in Sienna and Rome. I am so blessed. There are some wonderful pictures here: Assisi

Art Studies: Denison University, Indiana University, San Francisco State University, Michael Hayes artist and mentor, Eureka, California.

ART

Susan's World Studio

CHILDREN'S PORTRAITS — 6 original oils available, 3 fine art prints

MISCELLANEOUS ORIGINALS-1

MISCELLANEOUS ORIGINAL-2 — 3 original oils available

ASIA PAINTINGS — 2 original oils available, 3 fine art prints

STUDIES — 2 oils available

ARCHIVES

STUDIO

AVAILABLE FINE ART PRINTS
Fine art prints of four of my most popular Asia paintings are available to be special ordered. Each print, and the certificate of authenticity, is individually published and signed. These giclée prints are published by Meridian Design of Arcata, California. For more information on the history and production of giclée prints go to: giclée printing. If ordering a giclée please allow up to a month for your order to be prepared as I am often on the road.

Contact: susanonly@earthlink.net

MONTESSORI OVERVIEWS: My writing on Montessori education can be found here:

The Joyful Child Montessori overview for the child from birth to three+
Child of the World Montessori overview for the child from three to twelve+

Updated January 23, 2012

The organization behind all of Montessori work shared on this page, was begun as a Montessori project by our two daughters, Narda and Ursula, when they were teenagers; they named it after their baby brother. We thank you for your support this work! Montessori Shop

(Picture) The Michael Olaf Company in the Oakland/Berkeley area of the San Francisco Bay Area 26 years ago.
The children are visitors from Michael Olaf's Montessori 3-6 class.