2.Primary Education

Before attending the infant school a child may enter a maintained nursery school at the age of two，and a nursery class at three.Nursery education at its best is one of the happiest and most enlightened features of English education.There are no formal lessons；in a specially designed environment the children occupy themselves with indoor and outdoor play，choosing freely from the wide variety of toys and other material provided；with drawing，painting and modeling；with listening to stories told by the teacher；with singing nursery rhymes and dancing with pleasing rhythm to music；with learning to realize the value of money，weighs and measures through playing at shops and practicing domestic chores.It is a period of attitude and habit formation，with as much attention paid to social behavior and physical health as to preparation for more academic learning.

The formal state primary education is usually in two stages，an infant stage from five to seven or eight and a junior stage from seven to eleven.Sometimes these two stages are conducted in separate buildings，but more often in separate departments in the same building.Infant schools are usually co-educational and staffed ahnost entirely by women.A few junior schools are single-sex，but the overwhelming majority are co-educational.The numbers of pupils in primary schools vary greatly from fewer than 20children in a single teacher school to occasional huge schools of over 800pupils.But about half the schools in England have between 100and 300pupils.In Wales primary schools are generally smaller；nearly one-fifth have fewer than 50pupils and over one-third fewer than 100.

Life in the first year of the infant school is very similar to that in a nursery school；but the range of material is somewhat more pedagogical，and the children’s activities tend to be slightly more organized and systematized.In infant school classes，usually there is no formal syllabus.The teacher supervises an“Integrated Day”，in which the children work individually or in small groups on various activities：drawing，painting，modeling，cutting and pasting，reading，writing，figuring，and so on.From time to time they change from one activity to another，as interest declines，or the teacher judges it wise.She will every now and then gather the class together for collective activities.

In junior school children are expected to learn more skills and the teachers try to maintain a just balance between knowledge，skill，activity，and experience in this stage.Many junior schools are now trying to perform their proper and highly important function of fostering the potentialities of children，though this is often distorted by some examinations.

At the end of the primary school education children formerly had an eleven plus examination.This was a selective examination for the pupils to take an appropriate secondary education.Now the eleven-plus is abandoned in LEA schools in England and Wales.Pupils can directly go to secondary schools after finishing their primary education.