History
The first infant schools were established by Samuel Wilderspin, influenced by the schools set up at New Lanark by Robert Owen. They influenced development in continental Europe and North America.
When education became compulsory in England from 1877, infant schools were incorporated into the state school system.
Infant and junior schools were often separate schools, but the final three decades of the 20th century saw many infant and junior departments coming together as single primary schools. The late 1960s and 1970s saw hundreds of infant schools in Britain abolished in favour of 5-8 or 5-9 first schools, but some of these were abolished in favour of a return to infant schools by the early 1980s and most of them have now followed suit.
The introduction of the School Standards and Framework Act 1998 meant that classes in infant schools in England and Wales are limited to no more than 30 children per school teacher.
Read more about this topic: Infant School
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—John Ashbery (b. 1927)
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