Montessori has a long history in St. Louis. As early as 1913, a small class of children was created in the home of McKittrick Jones in Westmoreland Place in what is now the Central West End. The children are working with classic Montessori materials: dressing frames, pink tower, stereognostic materials, etc. and the two adults seemingly were trained Montessori guides. On the wall there is a diploma with the iconic Roman emblem of Romulus and Remus. Dr. Maria Montessori’s very first international course for teachers was in Rome in 1913. Presumably one or both of the women in the picture had attended Montessori’s first class. In 1913, Alexander Graham Bell, Thomas Edison, and Helen Keller endorsed her method of education.

In the 1960s, there was a revival of interest in the United States. In 1964, Mrs. R.E. Felling founded Countryside Montessori on Ladue Road as an AMI (Association Montessori Internationale) school and in 1967, she brought Pearl Vanderwall, a young woman who had trained with the dottoressa herself in 1944, to St. Louis.

At the request of Mario Montessori, Maria's son, Pearl founded the AMI Montessori Training Center of St. Louis in 1971, which was recognized as a 501(c)3 non-profit organization in 1972.

In 1991, after 20 years of training teachers, Pearl Vanderwall retired, leaving Annette Haines as the Director of Training. Annette, an AMI 3-6 teacher, had begun the AMI Training of Trainers Programme in 1982 and apprenticed under Vanderwall for the eight years it took her to become a fully qualified AMI Teacher Trainer. During that time, she earned an AMI Elementary diploma as well as a Masters and Doctorate in Education.

The Montessori Training Center held training courses, renting spaces at Villa di Maria Montessori School in Kirkwood and subsequently at Chesterfield Montessori School on Ladue Road. During this period, the training center also gave three AMI Primary satellite courses for Montessori teachers in Kansas City for the Kansas City Missouri School District.

In 2013, the training center purchased our current location in Grand Center. The property was renovated and opened the Training Center in June 2014 and the Lab School that September.

In 2016, MTCSTL began training Assistants to Infancy and expanded the Lab School to serve children ages 15 months to 3 years of age.

In 2017, MTCSTL purchased the building next door at 3858 Washington Blvd. and opened its doors in 2018 to offer Elementary Lab School class serving children ages 6-12.

Today, The Montessori Training Center of St. Louis continues to train guides in Missouri and from around the world. Students come from all over the United States and from as far away as Taiwan, Romania, Sweden, Russian, China, Korea, Mexico, etc. to attend its AMI course, which offers the most in-depth, complete, and authentic course on Montessori education available anywhere.