This book aims to show how the psychology of education extends our understanding of teachers' day-to-day work in the classroom as well as of children with particular problems. It aims to show how the psychology of education extends our understanding of teachers' day-to-day work in the classroom as well as our children with particular problems. In writing the book the broadview is taken of what constitutes educational psychology. Thus, it refers to research from developmental, social and clinical psychology where this has obvious implications for the world of the school. For the same reason it makes no apology for giving prominence to work on classroom interaction that falls into the grey area between the psychology and the sociology of education. The over-riding consideration, though, was that the book should address the immediate concerns of primary school teachers. If this book was to be useful, the authors believed it would have to avoid a "Cook's Tour" approach to educational psychology, with its comprehensive but necessarily superficial itinerary through all the main centres of influence. A consequence of this decision was that it demanded an inevitably idiosyncrotic selection of the work of psychologists which seemed to be of greatest importance for teachers. In particular, four themes recur throughout the book: (i) the varied and interacting influences of home, the extended family, the school and the classroom (amongst others) on children's development; (ii) the interactive nature of teaching, and the ways in which teachers and children affect each other's behaviour; (iii) the importance, both for teachers and for children, of "metacognitive" skills, ie the ability to reflect on the nature of a task, to recognise the demands it makes and to identify appropriate ways of overcoming them; (iv) the links between educational psychology and other disciplines. The final point deserves further explanation. The interests of psychologists do not arise purely from the disinterested pursuit of knowledge. They are grounded in philosophical views of the aims of education and the nature of childhood. Further, many of the concerns of educational psychologists are shared by sociologists. This book aims to make these links explicit. After an introductory chapter, chapter 2 examines contextual influences on teachers' understanding of children and on children's own development. This leads into chapter 3 which reviews recent thinking about provision for children with special educational needs especially learning and behavioural difficulties. Because the needs of these children cannot be seen in isolation from those of all other children in the class, chapter 4 considers recent work on classroom interaction. Chapter 5 analyses the ways in which teachers and pupils can make sense of their experience in school and chapter 6 approaches the vexed issue of classroom management from the position that effective management of behaviour is inextricably linked to management of learning throughout the curriculum. Because teachers and parents regard schools as having responsibilities which extend beyond the national curriculum, chapter 7 focusses on personal and social development. Chapter 8 draws together the themes of assessment evaluation that have been introduced in previous chapters. The final chapter provides an overview and discusses a model for professional development. Each chapter is followed by suggestions for further reading and siminar activities. The book is designed for use by practising primary school teachers and by students on B Ed and PGCE courses. It is intended to contribute to teachers' and students' professional awareness.