Because it was often hard for teachers to get parents to send their children to school, there were many cases of older children arriving who had never been to school before.
This example is from Llangyniew National School in 1889...

The entry from the school Log Book reads -
"Admitted Jane Foulkes, aged 10, of Heniarth Mill, never at school before and knows not the alphabet".
The same school had the same problem again in 1892, (it was a boy this time !) with an extra bit of difficulty for the teacher...

This entry from Llangyniew School Log Book reads -
"25th - Admitted John Jones, Gelli. 9 years of age and new not the Alphabet nor a word of English".
Unfortunately, it looks from this extract as if the teacher "new not" how to spell ! He got "knew" wrong, anyway !
There were many problems with English speaking teachers and Welsh speaking children in the early days of schooling in Wales.

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