ABSTRACT
The Parents and Children and Teachers (PACT) experience in Inner London Education Authority (ILEA) suggests that resources and support mechanisms operating from outside the schools can be very potent influences. In the ILEA it has not only become an umbrella term for structured home-reading schemes, but also refers to a loosely organised movement which supports all efforts to improve co-operation between parents and teachers. A team comprising an educational psychologist, an advisory teacher, an education welfare officer and a secretary were appointed to work in a small group of Hackney schools, in an attempt to help teachers work more effectively with children with learning difficulties. The experience of the Pitfield Project suggested that schools were taking up PACT schemes, or very similar schemes, in large numbers. The PACT committee, working through the Pitfield Project team, has tried to meet the demands of schools by providing regular in-service training both school-based and centre-based.
