ABSTRACT
This chapter discusses research on differentiation focusing on classroom practices and pedagogical strategies. It includes a brief discussion of institutional bias which develops the theme of the embeddedness, and therefore class-constructed nature of schooling and classroom practices. The chapter introduces the Maltese primary school setting and main research strategies in the field. It focuses mainly on the classroom practices of two State school primary teachers though for the sake of comparison and because grounded theorising within the field inevitably suggested that classroom practices were situationally embedded. The chapter draws upon data gathered both in the State and in the Private sector. It uses thick description, in the form of fieldnotes from a variety of classrooms to 'interrogate' the pedagogical strategies teachers draw upon. The chapter describes and explains the situational embeddedness of classroom practices and class pedagogies.
