Prince William Co. middle school teacher captured on video using racial slur during teaching lesson

A Prince William County middle school teacher was caught on cell phone video using the n-word several times while teaching a lesson to students.

The incident happened at Parkside Middle School and the video was posted to YouTube. The school district said the incident happened last school year about six months ago. However, FOX 5 was contacted by someone who said they were a teacher at Parkside and claimed the incident happened three weeks ago.

The teacher is heard on the video using the racial slur at least three times as the teaching lesson is apparently about how impactful the word can be.

A Prince William County Public Schools spokesperson said the 6-month-old video is heavily edited.

"The teacher had observed the students behaving inappropriately and was attempting to wake them up to the impact of a single word that people used to ignore," Prince William County Public Schools spokesperson Diana Gulotta said in a statement. "She did not intend to hurt or harass, but to educate. This video was brought to the attention of the principal earlier this school year and she has made it clear that it would have been preferable to teach the lesson without uttering the specific word."

The school district would not disclose if any disciplinary action was taken against the teacher.

FOX 5 is told the students who recorded the video did face disciplinary action.