The use of video in classroom research

Abstract

This chapter discusses the status of video records of classroom events vis-à-vis any interpretive accounts generated using such records as data. The choice to use video has methodological and theoretical entailments. We suggest four metaphors to characterise the role of video in classroom research: as a window through which to see the classroom; as a lens with which to focus on selected aspects of classroom activity; as a mirror catalysing teacher and student reflection on their practice; and as a distorting mirror, in which the researcher sees a representation of their own values and perspectives reconstituted as classroom data. Educational research, like research in the physical and biolog..