Members of the group then come to the activity wellversed
in known research on the problem and enter into
collaborative work under the mutual expectation that each
will apply known information to the solving the problem.
Should the solution not prove to be straightforward, the
group learns from what fails, discounting some solution
paths while raising others. In prior ethnographic work
(2005), Steinkuehler found that it was not unusual for
players to gather data about a specific monster or challenge
in the virtual world in Excel spreadsheets, create models of
the data in the form of simple mathematical equations, and
then argue about whose model was ‘‘better’’ in terms of
prediction and explanatory scope