Teachers in Ancient Greece

Teachers in ancient Greece only educated boys. Girls were educated at home by their mothers. Boys from well-to-do families were sent to school around the age of seven. In Sparta, boys at the age of seven were sent to a city-run military school and stayed in the barracks. In other city-states, each boy was accompanied by a slave called a paidogogos. The slave’s job was to insure the child’s good behavior. A grammatist taught reading, writing, and simple math. For education in music, a ketharistes taught his students how to play the lyre and an instrument that resembled the oboe. An instructor called a palaestra taught physical education. Most evidence suggests that teachers were poorly paid in early Greece, and they had a low status in society.