In this study, we examined maker‐centred learning from an epistemic perspective, highlighting the agentic role of material engagement and artefacts in learning and creativity. The use of physical materials plays a crucial role in maker activities where the socio‐epistemic aspects of knowledge creation entangle with the designing and making of physical artefacts. By taking a case study perspective, we analysed video data from nine design sessions involving a team of students (aged 13 to 14) developing an invention. First, we analysed knowledge that was built during the process. Our analysis revealed how design ideas evolved from preliminary to final stages and, together with the expressed design problems and conversations preceding the ideas, formed an epistemic object pursued by the team. Next, we included non‐human agencies into the analysis to understand the role of materials in the process. Features of materials and human design intentions both constrained and enabled idea improvement and knowledge creation, intermixing meanings and materials. Material making invited the students to not only rely on human rationalisation, but also to think together with the materials.

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The purpose of the article is to introduce a systematic, three-level video analysis method for tracing the emotional aspects of a collaborative design and making process. Maker-centred learning can evoke strong emotions affecting students’ motivation because it involves them in externalising their ideas through conceptual, visual and material artefacts. For analysing longitudinal collaborative processes, we developed the visual Making-Process-Rug video analysis method, which enables tracing materially mediated verbal and embodied making processes. We provide examples of the method using data, where a team of seventh-grade students performing regular schoolwork were engaged in using traditional and digital fabrication technologies for inventing, designing, and making artefacts. Taking a case study perspective, we focus on a team of four students who worked on a smart product project. We analysed video recordings from the team’s 11 hours of design and making sessions on three levels: macro, intermediate and micro. The benefit of the three-level method is that it allows simultaneous analysis of social-discursive and materially embodied aspects of activities. It also enables analysing large samples of video data systematically, and focusing on both micro-level and macro-level perspectives of activity. The method for identifying emotions from video data has potential for educational research on various fields, however, the culture-specific expressions and interpretations of emotions require special attention when developing the method further. Keywords: basic education, collaborative process, emotional expression, Making-Process-Rug, sociomateriality, video analysis method