The term “Folk education” was popular even in 19th century in Russia, when man marked out three main sorts of folk elementary schools:
Ministerial folk elementary school: aim – to become a state standard as a reliable in all ways folk school. Such schools were mean first of all for rural areas.
   The schools divided into two parts:  one-formed (apprenticeship- 3 years), subjects in schools : religion, Russian language ( including calligraphy), arithmetic and choir singing and double-formed (apprenticeship- 5 years): first form: o­ne-formed school. Second form: history, geography, natural science and drawing.
   In o­ne-formed schools was o­nly o­ne teacher, who must teach all pupils in the school. The pupils were divided into three educational lines\ departments:  junior, secondary and superior.
   Parish schools: aim- to spread and consolidate Orthodox knowledge and Christian morality among folk and give basic useful information. List of subjects: 1) Religion (prayers, Holy history and explanation of divine service and brief catechism); 2) Choir singing; 3) Reading of church and civil literature and writing; 4)basic  arithmetic. Parish schools supplemented at the expense of free county schools and domestic schools of literacy (annual).

   National primary schools: Such schools were situated in every national territory (remote area).
National primary schools divided into state annual schools: regular and  semi-regular and “exemplary” specialized schools : o­ne-formed and double-formed.
These schools differed from each other in apprenticeships, administration, leadership and pedagogical control’s features and age requirement.
   Common outline for national primary schools was “lack of teaching in native languages”.

   Leo Tolstoy’s name, well-known Russian classic also have been bound up with folk education. He had started some schools for rural children and even had got know European folk schools. But he had not supported ideas of European folk schools system. Tolstoy had stated his own  opinion in special articles where he proved that base for education  must be associated with “pupil’s freedom “ and  giving violence up in teaching.

   Any way, our Folk high school reflects Scandinavian experience in the question of folk education. At the very beginning, the main aim of non-formal adult education was spreading of information and raising of educational level for them, who had not opportunity to get sufficient basic education. In the focus of this movement were ideas of universal education and legal redress for citizens. Such work’s forms were famous in Sweden and Denmark even in the latter half of the 19th century.  First Folk high school ( Rodding Hojskole) appeared in Denmark in 1844. Except above-mentioned aims, study circles had solved another important problem: how could people obtain social changes when they joined hands with each other, how they could make a decision together.