The politics of teaching - arguments around school work; the spur and the bridle - changing the mode of curriculum control; modernizing professionalism - a culture of enquiry and teachers' labour league; the British way and purpose - the spirit of the age in curriculum history; social constructions of quality in teaching; encouraging license and insolence in the classroom - imaginging a pedagogic shift; a determining moment for teachers - the strike of 1985; reform dilemmas for the union - cultural changes and the labour process; the end of the modern in teaching? - implications for professionalism and work; second guessing the past - organizing in the market; orderings and disorderings - questions about the work of the primary head in the new public/private mix; a synthetic exit.