The discussion surrounding teaching work in schools, the specific characteristics of the knowledge that constitutes it, and the need for a revalorization of this profession as a challenge and perspective for reflection, has been taking place in many different forums, infiltrating the school and academic environments in different ways. This text addresses the subject based on a discussion of how we understand the school and its functions, how it is formally constituted, its ideas and ideals, and the ways we can see its reality based on the concrete practices that take place within it. This is because a recognition of the specific characteristics of knowledge woven into and circulating in the space-time of the school appears to be one of the necessary conditions for this reflection, and for understanding the teaching life, knowledge and the dilemmas that occur in the school, as well as the challenges, and prospects for the future. An understanding of the concepts of school and education that serve as the bases for the structure of the school and the school system helps reveal negotiations of meanings that take place in the different school environments, and which can be captured by study of the day-to-day school realities and the use teachers and pupils make of the rules given to them, and promote reflection on teaching practices in their daily reality.