A systematic analysis was made of the communications of 5- and 6-year-old children in two kindergarten classrooms to discover whether children's face-to-face interactions with peers included "face work" components (rituals through which individuals manage impressions when it becomes difficult to maintain a social situation) and, if so, in what forms these components were expressed. Field note data were obtained from classrooms located in separate large urban school districts in the Southeastern United States. One classroom was located in a middle-income, predominately white neighborhood; the other was in a working class neighborhood gradually being integrated racially. In the first classroom, 7 of 21 children were black. In the second, 4 of 24 were black. Eight girls were included in the first classroom; 13 were included in the second. Both classes were organized so that children had opportunities to interact away from adult intervention. Analytical questions included the following: Do children participate in face-work as they interact with their peers? Do children use avoidance processes in defensive and protective ways? Do children participate in corrective interchanges to restore spoiled interactive order? and, Do children aggressively take advantage of face-work rules to "make points" in classroom interactions? The results indicated that children did take corrective or remedial action when the images they projected were threatened. They also practiced aggressive uses of face-work principles to improve their relative status among peers. (RH)