Born of privilege, Helena Antipoff (1892-1974) lived a life of remarkable service. A psychologist by training, she was born to Russian aristocracy, her father serving as a general in the imperial army. When she was 16, along with her mother and younger sister, she traveled to Paris to continue her education. At the Sorbonne, Helena was able to attend the lectures of Pierre Janet, whose early work had inspired Freud. Later, in Geneva, she studied child psychology and principles of learning under the tutelage of the acclaimed Edouard Claparede. This marked the beginning of a lifelong friendship and correspondence. Antipoff obtained her degree in psychology, at the age of 24, staying on to conduct research on the measurement of intelligence with Claparede.
Antipoff returned to Russia upon receiving news that her father had been seriously injured during World War I. Staying in her homeland, she refocused her efforts on the disorders shown by children who had lost their parents in the War and preparing curricula for their re-education. She also met and married her husband, a writer named Viktor Iretzky and had her only child, Daniel. However, she and her husband fell out of favor with the communist regime and were forced to leave in exile, Iretzky in 1923 and Antipoff the following year. A permanent separation between the two soon followed and Helena retook the surname Antipoff. She was welcomed back to Switzerland by her old mentor Claparede at the Institute Jean-Jacques Rosseau, where she resumed her research and also taught.
Helena Antipoff’s Call to Brazil
Her reputation by now established, Antipoff was invited in 1929 by the Interior Minister of Brazil to come to that country to help improve the Brazilian educational system. There, with several other foreign scholars, she helped implement a national program of pedagogical improvement.
Ever the innovator, Antipoff also established the first Pestalozzi Society of Brazil, a group devoted to implementing the teaching strategies of the 19th century scholar. Pestalozzi’s progressive concepts. Far ahead of his time, Pestalozzi valued a child’s spontaneity, and self-motivated activities. He felt education must balance activities that engage the head, the heart and the hands.
The Pestalozzi Society, under Antipoff’s guidance, began serving students with behavior problems or learning disabilities of various kinds. Her educational model addressed learning issues and psychiatric challenges as well as providing training in agriculture and other practical skills. Her guiding mantra was “fix the man in the field and better the conditions of his life through schooling.”
A Life of Advocacy
Given her history, it will come as little surprise that Antipoff labored tirelessly through the 1930s to improve the social plight of various disadvantaged groups. She showed special interest in the poor, those with disabilities, and those who lived in the often neglected rural areas of Brazil. Antipoff also helped found a nursing home for writers, artists and teachers who had fallen on hard times.
Helena Antipoff’s efforts on behalf of these groups continued for the rest of her life. Her final project was seeing to the establishment of a nationwide federation of groups utilizing Pestalozzi learning principles. Her son Daniel wrote the biography of her remarkable life in 1975, the year after her death at the age of 82. Written in Portuguese, it has never been translated into English.
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