A research design is described which refines standard classroom observation schedules and techniques in order to reveal the social organization of schooling as the environment for processes of cultural transmission. The author believes a combination of longitudinal and cross-sectional study of classrooms and grade levels is the most effective way of examining the process of transmission. Ethnographic classroom research was carried out in a rural midwestern village over a nine-month period corresponding with the beginning, middle, and end of the school year. Cross-sectionally, every classroom from preschool through 12th grade was systematically observed. Longitudinally, each class was observed all day for at least three days. The research design yeilded testable data and conclusions that are comparable both within and between classrooms and grade levels in the village as well as between school systems. The author argues that high order generalizations about the process of schooling must be based on rigorous observation schedules such as the one described here. His research illustrates the fruitfulness of an ethnographic approach to classroom research. (Author/AV)