What's the British English for an elementary school graduate?

In British English, graduate refers only to earning a college or university degree. In U.S. English, graduate is also used for other schools (such as high schools).
Source: Merriam-Webster's Advanced Learner's English Dictionary, page 715.
What's the British English phrase for an elementary school graduate?

In what context do you wish to use such an expression?

sitifan said:

In British English, graduate refers only to earning a college or university degree.

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sitifan said:

What's the British English phrase for an elementary school graduate?

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Doesn’t the first sentence of your post make you think you’re asking an unanswerable question?

5jj said:

In what context do you wish to use such an expression?

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It's a common expression in Chinese. I am curious how to express it in British English.

sitifan said:

It's a common expression in Chinese. I am curious how to express it in British English.

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There's no way to express that. We don't "graduate" primary, junior or secondary school. (We also don't use "elementary school".) The general terms for schools in the UK are:

Primary = ages 4 to 7 or 8
Junior = ages 7 or 8 to 11
Secondary = 11 to 16
Sixth form college/technical college = ages 16 to 18
University = ages 18 and above

"Primary" is sometimes called "Infants". "Secondary" is sometimes "High".
For children younger than 4, there are kindergartens and nursery schools.

As you said yourself in post #1, we use "graduate" only for completing a university degree.

In the UK, we have primary (not elementary) schools for children aged 4 to 11, from which they proceed (not graduate) to secondary (often called high) schools.

In Chinese, to graduate is used loosely to mean to complete a course of any level, be it primary or secondary school (British). In English, you just say you complete a course (succcessfully).

tedmc said:

). In English, you just say you complete a course (succcessfully).

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We don't say that in BrE. We simply move (on/up) from primary to secondary school.

What we Americans call elementary school used to be called primary school or grade school. (I went to grade school.)

Tarheel said:

What we Americans call elementary school used to be called primary school or grade school. (I went to grade school.)

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Or even "grammar school."

I'm curious how the Brits go from "secondary" to "sixth form." Seems they skipped a few numbers.

SoothingDave said:

Or even "grammar school."

I'm curious how the Brits go from "secondary" to "sixth form." Seems they skipped a few numbers.

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I think"grammar school" is the oldest one, but I'm probably wrong. (I'm often wrong. )

SoothingDave said:

I'm curious how the Brits go from "secondary" to "sixth form." Seems they skipped a few numbers.

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When I was at school, the first year of secondary school (age 11) was called, unsurprisingly, the 'First Year'. The final year then was called the 'Fifth Year'. At that point you could stay on to do two more optional years to study at what we call 'A-level' (age 16 to 18). This final two-year enrolment (the sixth and seventh years) was called the 'Sixth Form'. Nobody uses 'First year', 'Second Year', 'Third Year' any more. Now it's 'Year 7', 'Year 8', 'Year 9'. The final two years are still known as 'Sixth Form', however.

There's no strong concept of 'graduation' from school for us, at least not for primary. When you transition from primary to secondary, you 'finish' primary and 'move up' to secondary. You don't get a certificate of achievement or have a ceremony or anything like that and there isn't much of a feeling of completion because you have to carry on your education anyway. When you finish secondary school, there is a feeling of completion because most kids finish their education at that point. Regardless of whether you've passed your compulsory exams, and regardless of whether you're going on to university, on the last day of secondary school, you 'finish school'.

jutfrank said:

When I was at school, the first year of secondary school (age 11) was called, unsurprisingly, the 'First Year'. The final year then was called the 'Fifth Year'. At that point you could stay on to do two more optional years to study at what we call 'A-level' (age 16 to 18). This final two-year enrolment (the sixth and seventh years) was called the 'Sixth Form'. Nobody uses 'First year', 'Second Year', 'Third Year' any more. Now it's 'Year 7', 'Year 8', 'Year 9'. The final two years are still known as 'Sixth Form', however.

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When I went to secondary school, we had a slightly odd situation which led us seemingly missing out a whole year. The secondary school I went to had previously been a grammar school so kids started there at 11 in, as you said, "First year". However, it had changed to a standard comprehensive school by the time I started and kids started there at 12, entering straight away at "Second Year". So I did "Second/Third/Fourth/Fifth Years" at secondary school and then went on to Sixth Form College.
I still struggle to work out how old a child is when I'm told "My son's in Year 8" or similar because those terms simply weren't used when I was at school. I generally simply add five to the name of the year and it's usually close enough, so someone in Year 8 is about 13.

emsr2d2 said:

kids started there at 12, entering straight away at "Second Year".

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How bizarre. I don't really understand that.

emsr2d2 said:

I still struggle to work out how old a child is when I'm told "My son's in Year 8" or similar because those terms simply weren't used when I was at school.

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Yes, me too! I still have to do a little calculation in my head to work it out.

emsr2d2 said:

I generally simply add five to the name of the year and it's usually close enough, so someone in Year 8 is about 13.

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Aha! Easy. I'll do this.

jutfrank said:

How bizarre. I don't really understand that.

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I think they just didn't want to change the names of the years! I was in the second intake to the comprehensive school. Not only had it previously been a grammar school but it had also been an all-girls school. Now it was co-ed! So when I joined straight into the Second Year, all the kids in the fourth and fifth years were girls, but the second and third years were mixed.

That's crazy.

I had a pretty unique situation at Sixth Form. My comprehensive, which was an all-boys school, had its sister all-girls school down the road, which it shared the Sixth Form with. Since at that time there wasn't a designated Sixth Form block, when I was doing my A-levels (all languages), all my classes were taught in the girls school, which had better language resources. For a whole year I was the only boy in a school full of fifteen hundred girls!