The environment consists of both physical context and social context. The previous two approaches attributed the learning only to the physical context. But the shared cognition approach places the focus squarely on the social context that is claimed to make the collaborations happen and not just the presence of the collaborators. By linking together specific contexts and the knowledge to be learned, peers learn conditions under which the knowledge should be applied. 2 Situations foster creative thinking.
Peers often learn how the knowledge they have can be applied in new situations.
3 Situatedness leads to the acquired knowledge being more practical in nature. According to this approach, collaboration is viewed as a process of building and maintaining a shared conception of a problem, thus ensuring a natural learning environment.