ABSTRACT
The Box of Delights’ success as a television series happened at a time when another cult had taken root in pupils’ extra-curricular activity. The pilot research outlined in this chapter explores the nature and significance of small group activity centred on microcomputer programming. Incorporating institutional criminality (graffiti) into that process merely adds a frisson. When pupils discuss the limitations of the computer, as experienced, they are only a small step away from examining their own ways of assembling and exploiting information. The whole experience of discovery about a computer’s capabilities and limitations can be a physical model to be interrogated and analysed. The timing of interventions then becomes the art of teaching and for the pupil the demand for teaching becomes an art in learning. The encouragement to over-demand the teacher’s help would diminish and the atmosphere of a colleaguial workshop would develop.
