grade school
Americannoun
noun
Etymology
Origin of grade school
An Americanism dating back to 1850–55
Example Sentences
Examples are provided to illustrate real-world usage of words in context. Any opinions expressed do not reflect the views of Dictionary.com.
In grade school, he was aloof and preferred the company of musical scores.
From Los Angeles Times • Apr. 23, 2026
The two know each other from grade school years earlier but hadn’t been friends, and now they’re gawky teenagers practiced in the supreme virtue of adolescence, which is to be cool.
From The Wall Street Journal • Apr. 17, 2026
It’s been speculated, notably by MSNOW’s Chris Hayes, that Trump was looking at the Mercator Projection map that we probably all remember from our grade school geography textbooks.
From Salon • Jan. 18, 2026
Recall from grade school fraction math that you may cancel diagonally; the two “sales” disappear, as do the “assets.”
From Barron's • Dec. 26, 2025
I haven’t been in the emergency room since I got clipped by a sled and knocked myself out in the park in grade school.
From "It’s Kind of a Funny Story" by Ned Vizzini
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Definitions and idiom definitions from Dictionary.com Unabridged, based on the Random House Unabridged Dictionary, © Random House, Inc. 2023
Idioms from The American Heritage® Idioms Dictionary copyright © 2002, 2001, 1995 by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. Published by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company.