ABSTRACT
This chapter explores classroom life in small schools. It also explores how the teachers and children go about their work. The chapter presents the general aspects of the teachers' and the pupils' day. It focuses on the relationship between classroom behaviour and the content of the curriculum, and the way in which teachers distributed their time, particularly when working with individual pupils. The chapter presents the observation instrument used to record behaviour; the observer would focus on one of the 'target' children and record the child's behaviour every five seconds. After making ten such recordings and noting the child's task, the observer would focus on the next target child until all nine target pupils had been observed. The teacher was observed at six regular intervals during each lesson. Both the teacher's and the pupils' behaviour was recorded in terms of a set of categories of talk, non-interactive behaviour, audience, and location.
