Winifred Stoner

Background

Her development was heavily influenced by her mother and collaborator Winifred Sackville Stoner. Winifred Sackville Stoner Junior. was born in Evansville, Indiana, the daughter of Winifred Sackville Stoner (ca 1870-1931).

Career

Mother Stoner"s own child proved a successful learner in her own right. By age three, the younger Stoner could read and write capably. By six, she could use a typewriter and had had an illustrated book of her poems published.

By eight, she spoke at least five languages and had translated Mother Goose into Esperanto ("Patrino Anserino").

At nine, she passed the entrance exams for a prominent national university. The two collaborated through the 1920s on a monthly promotional publication entitled "Mother Stoner"s Bulletin".

Winifred Sackville Stoner, Junior. is especially known for poems, rhymes and mnemonic jingles that aid in the recollection of information. One of her best known poems is entitled, The History of The United States., which some people may be able to recite, verbatim, but which most know only by its first two lines: "In fourteen hundred ninety-two, Columbus sailed the ocean blue And found this land, land of the Free, beloved by you, beloved by medical " Stoner sought to popularize these informative poems against the ""unquestionably" evil influence exerted by popular nursery jingles upon infant minds." Simple Simon, she said, encouraged stupidity, while Jack Be Nimble "puts ideas into children"s heads" that could lead to injuring themselves.

She hoped that her rhymes would replace those of Mother Goose.

Of her private life: "Unfortunately, there are emotions that go beyond the restraining influence of any education." "There is nothing more terrible for any child than to be put up as an example of precocity and to be expected to shine in all things and at all times." " 1.

Achievements

• "Mother Stoner," founder of the Natural Education movement, was an innovative educator who promoted the importance of fun in learning.

Views

Quotations: Of her private life: "Unfortunately, there are emotions that go beyond the restraining influence of any education."

"There is nothing more terrible for any child than to be put up as an example of precocity and to be expected to shine in all things and at all times.".