A primary school, or elementary school, is a school in which children receive primary

or elementary education between the ages of about five to eleven, coming

before secondary school and after preschool. It is the first stage of compulsory
education in most parts of the world, and is normally available without charge, but may
be a fee-paying independent school.
In the United States, "primary school" may refer to a school with grades Kindergarten
through second grade (K-2). In these municipalities, the "elementary school" includes
grade three through five.
[1]

The term primary school is deriv
Until Elementary schools were established by Elementary Education Act
1870, the only options available to parents were for children to pay for
tuition at private schools, or be accepted for free charitable schools such
as Ragged schools, which did not charge for attendance.
Initially offering an education to local children up to the 10, this was raised
in stages to 14 by 1944 when the Education Act 1944 replaced them.
[1]

Elementary schools were set up to enable children to receive manual
training and elementary instruction. They provided a restricted curriculum
with the emphasis on reading, writingand arithmetic (the three Rs). The
schools operated on a 'monitorial' system, whereby one teacher supervised
a large class with the assistance of a team of monitors, who were quite
often older pupils. Elementary school teachers were paid by results. Their
pupils were expected to achieve precise standards in reading, writing and
arithmetic such as reading a short paragraph in a newspaper, writing from
dictation, and working out sums and fracti
This article is about a type of school which operated in England and Wales
between 1870 and 1944. For other types of school with that name,
see Elementary school.
Elementary schools (sometimes Higher elementary schools) were
the first schools in England which were funded by taxation. They operated
between 1870 and 1944 and providing an education for children between
the ages of 5 and 14. In some areas older children were educated in
separate 'Higher Elementary Schools'. Many of these schools converted
to Primary schools after 1944.