ABSTRACT
J. Roschelle characterized the process of “learning by collaborating” as a search of convergence among members. This chapter presents a contrasting claim that each member is individualistic in how s/he interprets the learning task, how s/he solves it, and what kind of understanding s/he gains from collaboration. It re-analyzes protocol data of collaborative learning processes in Roschelle and H. Shirouzu, N. Miyake & H. Masukawa to show that members’ verbalizations reflecting their interpretations or re-interpretations are individualistic through the processes. Shirouzu also used a similar task in a small-case learning experiment with six 6th grades only to find individual differences in the quality of their reports of six months later depending on their verbalization during the experiment. Careful analyses on the language use in collaboration makes possible to feed a better folk-model of collaborative learning back to everyday learners.
