When videos become more than data: Rethinking how we study teaching and learning

Video has become an increasingly valuable resource in educational research. Large video databases now enable researchers to examine teaching and learning in ways that were once difficult to imagine, opening new possibilities for investigating classroom interactions, student thinking, and instructional practices. Yet video can offer more than a record of what happens in the classroom. In a commentary published on  September 1, 2018 in ECNU Review of Education , Sihan Xiao explores how video serves as a catalysts for reflection, dialogue, and collaborative inquiry into the cultural dimensions of teaching and learning.

The article draws on the Video Mosaic Collaborative (VMC), an open-access video database containing hundreds of hours of footage documenting mathematics teaching and learning. Previous research has highlighted the VMC's value for collaborative analysis of student learning and mathematical reasoning. Xiao, however, examines a different possibility: using video not only to study classroom activity but also to prompt teachers to reflect on the discuss their own understandings of teaching and learning.

To explore this approach, the author conducted a video-cued interview with three experienced elementary mathematics teachers in Shanghai. The teachers watched a series of VMC videos featuring a student named Stephanie as she worked on a mathematical task involving combinations of colored towers across several grade levels. They were invited to pause the videos, share their observations, raise questions, and discuss their interpretations. Their conversations were subsequently analyzed alongside existing analyses of VMC videos.

Two recurring themes emerged from the discussions. The first concerned the role of task contexts in mathematical learning. Earlier VMC analyzes had emphasized the importance of maintaining a consistent task context to support conceptual development. The Shanghai teachers offered a different perspective, arguing that students should encounter the same mathematical idea in a range of contexts drawn from everyday life. In their view, varied contexts helps students recognize underlying mathematical structures across situations and develop the ability to apply their knowledge to unfamiliar problems.  

The second theme focused on classroom interaction and the teacher's role in supporting student learning. The teachers responded positively to the collaborative discussions among students shown in the videos, recognizing peer interaction as a valuable learning resource. They also questioned whether every student in a discussion group was equally engaged and benefiting from the exchange. Particular attention was given to students who appeared less confident or less inclined to speak. The teachers emphasized that the teachers have a responsibility to ensure that all students remain meaningfully involved in the learning process.

Beyond these substantial observations, the commentary highlights the methodological value of video-cued interviews. Videos served as mediating tools, grounding discussions in specific classroom events and allowing participants to revisit interactions in detail. Teachers returned to particular moments, replayed sequences, and drew on shared visual evidence to develop and support their interpretations. In this way,  video helped bring abstract educational beliefs into concrete, evidence-based conversations. The discussions also revealed cultural assumptions that might otherwise have remained unspoken. By reflecting on instructional practices presented in the VMC videos, the Shanghai teachers articulated educational ideas that they might ordinarily have taken for granted.

Looking beyond the interview, the commentary identifies several directions for future research. These include closer attention to the multimodal dimensions of classroom interaction, the use of video in teacher professional development, more sustained engagement with the ethical challenges of video production and interpretation, and the expansion of multivocal research approaches that bring together perspectives from diverse educational settings and cultural contexts. Xiao also underscores the value of internationally accessible video resources and cross-cultural collaboration in fostering broader conversations about teaching and learning.

The central message is that videos need not remain static records of classroom activity. They can generate new questions, bring educational assumptions into view, and create space for meaningful professional dialogue. By bringing multiple voices together around shared visual experiences, video-based research can offer deeper insights into educational practice and the cultural perspectives that shape how teaching and learning are understood.