The major purpose of this study was to investigate selected personality characteristics of high and low rated, open and traditional classroom teachers who teach economically disadvantaged primary school children. A second purpose of the study was to investigate the assumptions which high and low rated, open and traditional teachers of the poor hold about open education. The Edwards Personal Preference Schedule, the Thurstone Temperament Schedule, and the Barth Scale were administered to 30 open and 30 traditional primary grade teachers, each rated by a supervisor as high or low in teaching ability. The high, open group contained 15 teachers; the low open section included 15; teachers in the high traditional subdivision numbered 15, while the low traditional category also included 15 teachers. The results demonstrated no significant personality differences between high and low rated open and traditional teachers. Open teachers, however, appear to emphasize intuitive judgment when assessing a child's work. In contrast, traditional teachers are more likely to rely on objective tests to determine what the child has learned. Whereas open teachers tend to believe that learning occurs through exploration, unthreatened by adults, traditional teachers are likely to feel that a child learns best when knowledge is transmitted by the teacher to the child. (Author/JM)