Word.ws English Dictionary

three R's

three R's is the alternative form of three Rs.

Meaning of three Rs

Noun

the three Rs pl (plural only)

  1. (plural, plural-only) The basic education received in primary schools, especially (but not necessarily limited to) reading, writing and arithmetic.
    • “You shall teach me, and when I am a woman we will set up a school where nothing but the three R's shall be taught, and all the children live on oatmeal, and the girls have waists a yard round,” said Rose, with a sudden saucy smile dimpling her cheeks.1875, Louisa M[ay] Alcott, chapter 8, in Eight Cousins
  2. (broadly, plural, plural-only) The basic precepts of any subject matter.
    • Chapter 11: The Big C and the Three Rs: Chores, Relaxation, Recreation, and Rebellion2002, Barbara Coloroso, Kids are Worth It!: Giving Your Child the Gift of Inner Discipline
  3. (plural, plural-only) Reduce, reuse and recycle.

Questions about three R's

What is three R's the alternative form of?
Three R's is the alternative form of three Rs.

Words near three R's in the dictionary

  1. three quarter-time
  2. three quarter-times
  3. three quarters
  4. three quartertime
  5. three quartertimes
  6. three R's
  7. three ring circus
  8. three ring circuses
  9. Three Rivers
  10. Three Rocks
  11. three Rs

Source and license

Adapted from Wiktionary: three R's (page history and authors); three Rs (page history and authors). Text available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 license. Word.ws reformatted the entry and added links. Wiktionary data of 2026-09-02.

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Cite this entry: “three R's.” Word.ws, https://word.ws/three_r%27s. Based on Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0.