French school structure (vs. American school structure)

Note: I'm going to reserve the "In which" title constructions for posts about things that we actually do. Since this isn't really about something of that sort, I'm going to give it a non standard (for me) title.

I promised last night (or rather, early this morning), that I'd write something more about the big test, the baccalauréat, that French students take at the end of high school. And, well, I will. But that may be a post for another day. After all, it takes place toward the end of things, and it's worth beginning at the beginning, in my not so humble opinion. So, we start with the French school structure and how it compares with the American structure. (After all, then I can drop in a lycée or a collège or a primaire and you'll all know what I'm talking about. Mostly I'm just lazy.)

As you can see from this (oh so elegant) chart, the French system has four levels of school. (Before university that is. In a couple of years, when I've got a kid in university, I'll go back and update with useful information about the way that works. At this point, you can just assume that there's something called université that comes at the bottom of the chart.) Right now, I have kids in three of the four levels: Cherry is in CM1 in école primaire, Ezio is in cinquième in collège, and Sapphire is in seconde in lycée.