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Nurture groups have a long history in educational theory and practice, however since the government’s stated support of their use as part of the school behavioural strategy in 1997, their use in UK primary schools has been on a steady increase, and 2004’s Every Child Matters (DfES, 2004), solidified this institutionalisation. Nurture groups represent one of the primary ways in which schools may attempt to tackle the challenges posed by the perceived increase in children’s Emotional and Behavioural Difficulties (EBDs). As such they represent an attempt to fill part of the considerable resource gap for problems of this kind, however, they are not without problems of their own. Firstly, the rise of the nurture group can be seen as part of the rise of therapeutic discourse within primary education. Its wisdom is that of developmental psychology, couched in the language of risk and self-esteem; the increasing hold that pre-occupations such as these have in education must continue to be questioned. Secondly, as part of an early intervention based on withdrawal from the mainstream, nurture groups present several paradoxes amongst the politics of recognition and inclusion. These issues will be discussed in light of ethnographic data drawn from observations and interviews was collected over a period of 8 months, from September 2006. Through this data, it will be argued that the everyday politics of the nurture groups in these sites has emerged through a discourse which may actually work to disempower those staff and children most closely associated with the groups. In conclusion discussion will focus on the productive effects of therapeutic discourse in …