‘Educating Teacher’: Women and Elementary Teaching in London, 1900–1914

Abstract

The nineteenth century as a whole witnessed a rise in the status of the elementary teacher, but the period after 1870 saw a rapid acceleration in this process and a broadening of the social class base from which elementary school teachers were recruited. After the 1870 Education Act and subsequent Acts, which made elementary education both compulsory and free, the demand for elementary teachers rose rapidly. It was mainly working-class children who attended elementary schools since middle and upper-class children were educated at private schools or at home.