This paper reports an experience of technical support to a public school located in a socially underprivileged neighbourhood of Brazil’s federal capital. We selected a class in the final year of primary education (5th grade) composed of preadolescents and adolescents, many of them repeaters in previous grades. The research is structured in the form of an exploratory case study making use of a field log for live observations, the sociometric test itself and a questionnaire designed determine the profile of all student class members. Interviews were held with the class teacher and other educators and documents associated to the school’s educational project were analysed. The research work proved to be sensitive, low cost and useful to the school insofar as it provided a portrait of the web of social relations and identified sociability problems and their driving forces, most of which were unknown to the educators. In the discussions with educators the researchers assisted them to delineate action plans for sociability learning and medium and long-term measures for overcoming violence in school. Conclusions identify education policy issues to be addressed by schools to ensure that the transition from primary to secondary education does not aggravate the changes students are experiencing in their lives and favours their successful schooling.

School violence, Bullying, Living together, Sociometrics, Interpersonal relations, Teacher training.