Education1

===**WHAT WAS EDUCATION AND SCHOOL LIKE IN SHAKESPEARE'S ENGLAND? HOW WAS IT DIFFERENT IN URBAN/RURAL LIFE? HOW WAS IT DIFFERENT IN NOBLE/MERCHANT/COMMON LIFE? **=== Answered by: Berj B. At that time there was no national system of education. Only a small amount of kids went to formal school. These kids were mostly boys, and started at around the age of 6. Depending on how wealthy or noble their families were, the level of education varied. Those in rural life were isolated from those in the city. They were considered isolated because they didn’t need to travel much, for they had all they needed as they made their essentials themselves. The maximum they needed to travel was half a day’s walk. The village livers did not that have much money, so to improvise they would bargain with what they did have for what they needed. If you lived in the village, due to the small community, you would know everyone. Family bonds often formed between brothers and sisters, aunts and uncles. Later on in the Elizabethan era, agriculture’s popularity began to decrease. Farmers had to go to towns looking for jobs. The trading of wool began to increase and take agriculture’s place. What was once farm land, was now an open field for sheep.

The less wealthy would go to petty schools; these were mainly children of urban merchants. There were two kinds of the petty schools, public and private. In the public petty schools, the noble funded them. Regardless of whether you were rich or poor, you could attend to the public petty school. Only boys were allowed to attend the public school though. At private school, the student’s parents had to pay a fee for their child to attend. At any of the petty schools they were taught to read, write, and the beginning levels of arithmetic. These children were not in a school building but in the house of the teacher. When they went to grammar school, it was very strict. It began at six o'clock in the morning and finished at five o'clock in the evening. They only received about two hours of break during high noon. Once you were the age of 14 you could then attend a university.

A private tutor, at either the child’s household or another noble person’s household, would teach the noble child. Unlike the rural children, the noble child would begin school around the age of 7 until he was about 14. When they were younger than 7 they would have spent their early childhood being taught by attendants, a junior master or senior pupil at the grammar school. The Noble child would be taught the same as the petty child, just in a different environment. Though their pocket change was varied, children in England learned the same things. Here is a picture of a petty school Works Cited Briggs, Asa. //A Social History Of England//. New York: The Viking Press, 1984. Print. Trevelyan, G. M. //A History of England; New Illustrated Edition//. Great Britain: Longman Group Limited, 1973. Print. Wagner, John A. //Historical Dictionary of the Elizabethan World//. Phoenix, Arizona: The Oryx Press, 1999. Print.