ABSTRACT
The most important skill learnt at school, as pupils keep pointing out, is that of dealing with other people. Relationships, both positive and destructive, are at the heart of the social experience of school. Behaviour is observed and closely structured. Every nuance of command and control, of disobedience and submissiveness, is part of the learning process. Teachers are judged and labelled by their abilities to keep control, or not, and all the complex social interactions of the hierarchies of school, including the most emotional displays of hurt and stress, are closely observed. Pupils keep a close eye on what is happening. They analyse the inner meanings and implications of all actions. That they react differently to different teachers is a truism so apparent that no one appears to think about it. The implications are, however, enormous. The school is the symbol of society, of ordered society at least, as a whole. There are certain people in command, with power, whose idiosyncrasies and weaknesses are centrally important to the pupils. Their own personal success or failure depends upon these.
