Integrating PowerMeeting into Blackboard Learning Environment: Synchronous Collaboration Support in Asynchronous Collaboration Context

A cognitive framework and a concrete methodology for integrating real-time groupware (Power Meeting) into an asynchronous learning support system (Blackboard) has been presented. User studies on such integrated systems have shown that such integration grounds synchronous collaboration in a asynchronous collaboration context and provides a smooth moving from asynchronous collaboration workspace into synchronous collaboration workspace. The meeting support and group decision support in Power Meeting have provided useful added values to the Blackboard learning environment for supporting student group projects.