According to the local authority, the idea behind the proposal isn't about saving up money, but ensuring the future sustainability of small schools, many of which have low occupancy.

It's also believed the move would free up time for head teachers who are often stressed out with a demanding workload, which as well as management and administration duties, includes teaching responsibilities.

The proposal, put forward by the council's education and children's services committee, also comes at a time when the Scottish Government is consulting on proposed legislative reform to introduce a presumption agains the closure of small rural schools.

The move could also halt the high turnover of headteachers who move on from small schools to those with more than five classes, where they are not required to teach as well.

The committee heard that this situation can mean that pupils and families in rural communities can have "discontinuity in educational experience".

If the scheme gets the go-ahead, it has been promised that full consultation will be carried out with teachers and parent councils to establish if this is the right move for the particular school concerned.

The committee has recommended that a list of possible schools where the idea could be viable, should now be drawn up.

However, the committee's vice-chair, St Andrews councillor Robin Waterston said no-one would be forced into accepting a situation they didn't want.

He explained that in a survey carried out, 42 of the headteachers responded with 12 per cent, or six teachers, saying they were not in favour of the move.

Amongst the reasons cited was that they wanted to continue teaching as well as fulfilling their other responsibilities.

Councillor Waterston said that each school would be looked at on a "case by case" basis and that if the move did go ahead it was likely that a deputy head with teaching responsibilities would be appointed, while a principal teacher took the lead at the school which was not the main base for the headteacher.

During the meeting, mention was made of the case of Kingsbarns and Dunino primary schools which have had a joint headteacher arrangement since November 2004.

Councillor Waterston said the set-up there seemed to work well and showed that in some cases, headteacher sharing can be a positive move.