From Australia’s Jewish Past: Lillian Daphne de Lissa – leader in the Montessori early childhood education
Lillian was born on 25 October 1885 in Darlinghurst Sydney, the sixth child of Montague de Lissa, a merchant and his wife Julia.
Lillian Daphne De Lissa
She was musically gifted and studied at a private college in Woollahra. However, she was more interested and inspired by the transformation of the very poor area where the Woolloomooloo Free Kindergarten was situated and decided she would dedicate her career to the education of young children. In 1902, she attended the Sydney Kindergarten Teachers College in Darlinghurst where she was influenced by the work and philosophies of the principal, Frances Newton, brought to Sydney from Chicago on a three-year contract.
Frances laid the foundation stone for the success of the Sydney Kindergarten Training College in Waverley. Lillian commenced working as a kindergarten director at Ashfield Free Kindergarten and in 1904 she enrolled in a teaching course in order to have a broader influence on early childhood education. Lillian, who had been a star pupil under Frances, was invited to travel with her to Adelaide in 1905 to report on their philosophies of early childhood education. Her compassion was tempered by a sharp intellect, while her personality, beauty, and logical claims for kindergarten principles attracted support for the formation of the South Australian Kindergarten Union.
In 1906, she became the Founding Director, assisted by young women voluntary helpers. Adelaide’s first Free Kindergarten was established in a Franklin Street cottage in the city’s ‘’slums’’. She lived for a year in a cottage next door to the kindergarten where neighbouring families were in cramped, often unsanitary housing and infant mortality rates were high. Surviving children often caught infectious diseases and sought play space in the streets among horse-drawn traffic. Lillian modelled her teaching methods on the work of Friedrich Frobel, a German educator, who is often referred to as the founder of kindergarten education. She continually related theory to practice, regarding improved child welfare and education as the basis of social reform. She held extra classes for older children, arranged mothers’ meetings and made visits where she gave informal instruction in hygiene and child care.
In 1907, the Kindergarten Teachers Training College was founded in Adelaide with eleven students. Lillian was appointed as its Founding Principal as well as Director of the Union. In 1909 she became a foundation member and, briefly, a councillor of the Women’s Political Association. The following year, she successfully led a crusade against a proposal to absorb the Kindergarten Training College into the University Training College, with herself as lecturer. She visited Perth in 1911 and instigated the formation of the Kindergarten Union of Western Australia. In 1912 a royal commission was held into education which resulted in continued government financial support for the Union and consequent independence for the College.
For the next two years Lillian travelled in Europe with her primary reason being to study in Rome with Maria Montessori, where she successfully gained a diploma qualification in Montessori education. The next influence in Lillian’s life was a meeting with Belle Rennie, an enthusiast for the Montessori method who organised for the New Ideals in Education organisation to invite Lillian to give a keynote address at its second conference in Ruston, UK. It was at this conference that they agreed that the organisation should establish a new training facility where teachers could learn about Montessori’s teaching methods and her education style. Belle took the lead on the idea, and she persuaded the Board of Education to give accreditation to her new Gipsy Hill College in South London, which was affiliated to Kingston University. It was at Belle’s College where the ideals of the Montessori education style and the Dalton Plan were emerging. Lillian’s travels throughout Europe allowed her to complete a report for the South Australian Government on ‘Education in Certain European Countries’ (1915). Lilian returned to Adelaide in 1915 and introduced and gave public lectures about the Montessori methods.
In 1917 Lillian left Adelaide for England. The Mail Newspaper reported that ‘’she was invited to take up the position of Principal of the Montessori Training College in London.’’ By 1917, she became the foundation principal of the Gipsy Hill Training College in Surry, which was a residential college for nursery school teachers. This led to the formation of the Nursery School Association of Great Britain and Northern Ireland. Lillian served as Principal for the College for twenty-nine years. During this time she published several books on life in the nursery school and in early babyhood.
In 1943, under the auspices of the British Ministry of Information and the Child Study Association of America, Lillian was invited on a six-month lecture tour which was so well received that she had to extend her time due to capacity audiences wherever she travelled. She influenced the decision to have nursery schools included in the 1944 British Education Act.
Lillian retired in 1946 but continued to advise on early childhood issues from her cottage in Oxshort, Surrey. She remained Chairman of the Consultative Committee on Nursery-Infant Education for three years. In 1955, she returned to Adelaide for the Kindergarten Union’s Golden Jubilee.
Lilian died at Dorking Surrey on 16 October 1967. In her memory, the Lillian de Lissa Nursery School was opened in Birmingham and in 1979, the former Adelaide Kindergarten Training College became the de Lissa Institute of Early Childhood and Family Studies at the University of South Australia, and a scholarship is named in her memory.
The AJHS acknowledges the following references in the preparation of this story:-
Australian Dictionary of Biography – Helen Jones; Wikipedia; South Australia History Hub; State Library of South Australia
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