ABSTRACT
Perceptions of what primary education is about have changed radically since the intro duction of the concept and the term in The Primary School (Board of Education 1931). This report (known as the Hadow Report) is where we find the first rationale provided for primary education, following the establishment of the notion of two distinct stages of education, primary and secondary, to replace elementary education. In Hadow we find a reasoned rationale for the curriculum, teaching, organisation and staffing of the primary school, drawing on what was known about children’s development and learn ing. The language used is not at odds with what many primary teachers believe now:
the curriculum in the primary school is to be thought of in terms of activity and experience rather than of knowledge to be acquired and facts to be stored . . . the primary school can do nothing more useful than to help children gain a thorough command of the mother-tongue, to use books freely as a source of information and pleasure, and to express their ideas readily in writing. (Board of Education 1931:96)
Similarly, the report spoke of 'the great and special virtues’ of whole-class teaching, while acknowledging the 'limits to its flexibility and therefore its usefulness’ in meeting
the Varying needs of children’. The report’s underlying philosophy, focusing on the needs of young learners, is striking.
