The objective in this paper is to demonstrate methodological choices concerning time scales in video studies. Time scales are processes, or units of analyses, that can vary from seconds or minutes to hours, weeks and even the whole school year, thus human activity, action and social practice take place on one or several time scales (Lemke, 2000, pp. 273, 275).

According to Lemke (2000, 2009, p. 277), educational research can be represented on many time scales. However, time scales limit our interpretations, and the selected time scale impact how we create meaning and interpret findings (Lemke, 2009, p. 277). Hence, different time scales affect different interpretative ambitions. Lemke (2000, 2009) argues that researchers should adopt additional and different timescales for analysing classroom teaching and learning. The selection of data determines which events that are analysed (Derry et al., 2010). Hence, taking excerpts from larger data material means only fragments of the context are examined.

Our objective is to problematize the use of different time scales, and the research question is “How can different time scales affect the interpretation and the results in video studies?”

We use video recordings of five students, as an example of how the choice of different time scales can produce various results and understandings of the same empirical data material. The five students are performing an oral presentation about party drugs, and their presentation is a result of a project work. The actual presentation, which lasts for five minutes, has been analysed in a previous article (Authors, 2012a). However, in this paper we analyze the same five minutes in addition to recordings of the previous two lessons.

Oral presentations can be talks, speeches and lectures and performances of poems, narratives, plays and stories (Penne & Hertzberg, 2008). Oral presentations are often related to project work and are frequently used in Norwegian secondary classrooms (Authors, 2012b). Project work is a teaching method, which requires that the students take responsibility for their own learning. Instead of having the teacher present facts and knowledge, students are responsible for collecting, seeking and constructing the learning content (Bransford, Brown, & Cocking, 2004). When using project work, the emphasis is often on problem solving, practical work, student participation and cooperation with peers (Barron & Darling-Hammond, 2010, p. 203). Hence, project work requires more structure and support from teachers than other teaching methods (Barron & Darling-Hammond, 2010, pp. 201, 212). However, research shows that when project work is defined as largely student led, the teachers become rather passive and withdrawn (Author, 2007; Author, 2013). Furthermore, the teachers' assessments and feedback of the project work are often related to the students' actual performance of the oral presentation (Wikan, Mølster, Faugli, & Hope, 2009), and the students' cooperation skills and their involvement with the task are not evaluated.

When preparing and performing oral presentations, students receive little help and feedback from teachers on topics, themes and content. There is also a lack of instruction when it comes to developing the students' cooperation and presentation skills (Author et al., 2012). When students are working on oral presentations, they need to cooperate with peers, work independently on tasks and assignments, plan their time and seek relevant information. Hence, oral presentations require that students self-regulate (Perry, Hutchinson, & Thauberger, 2008; Zimmerman & Schunk, 2009). 

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