While different types of research techniques such as ethnography, case study and illuminative evaluation have gained increasing prominence, they have rarely been used in the context of comparative research on teachers (Broadfoot [3]). Drawing upon a comparative study of teachers' conceptions of their professional responsibility and classroom practice in two different national contexts and educational traditions – England and France – this paper emphasises the importance of such ethnographic research techniques used in conjunction with more quantitative methods. It describes some of the themes and issues which have emerged from the first stage of this study, a questionnaire survey, and argues the need for such survey findings which illuminate differences between teachers in the two countries to be extended and explored further in more intensive and qualitative comparative classroom studies.