The paper deals with the characteristics of learning and teaching the Croatian language. According to the timeframe Croatian language presents the most important subject in elementary education. Croatian language classes take place from the 1st to the 8th grade of elementary school, and is divided into: literature, Croatian grammar, media culture and also linguistic expression. Research is being conducted in accordance with the fundamental features of the teaching the Croatian language from 1st to 4th class. Respondents are elementary school teachers which are examined by anonymous polling. The focus of the paper is on the most common used methods and forms of work in the teaching practice of the Croatian language, so the variety of motivational procedures is being explored. More specifically it is determined whether the teachers encourage creativity during their teaching of the Croatian language in primary education. The second point is the deviation whether the teachers are - not at all/partially/fully - far from planned curriculum. When talking about going in school, we are also talking about the transition from the native language to the Croatian standard language. The third focus of this work shows the relationship between native and standard language and it indicates whether pupils love the standard language. It has been found that linguistic content is the most demanding which we try to confirm or deny at the last point.