1. Basic PowerPoint Skills

2. What is a Presentation? Presentation: an informative speech that usually includes visuals, such as slides. The file name for the current presentation is displayed on the title bar. Default view is normal view. Normal view divides the window into 3 parts: Outline tab Slide tab Notes pane: type speaker’s notes

3. Planning a presentation A successful presentation is carefully planned so it clearly conveys a message. 3 steps in the planning stage Carefully plan the lecture or speech. Determine the content of the slides. Determine the design and layout of the slides, and then sketch the slides using pencil and paper.

4. Adding or deleting slides The current slide is the slide displayed in the slide pane. New slides are added after the current slide.

5. Editing a Slide Placeholders: PowerPoint has a feature called AutoFit that automatically sizes text as it is typed so that it fits within a placeholder. Serif font: has strokes on the ends of the letters. (ex. times new roman) Sans serif: there is no strokes on the ends of the letters. (ex. arial)

6. PowerPoint views Normal view: best for editing the text and graphics on a slides. Slide sorter view: useful for selecting multiple slides and changing the order of the slides. Slide show view: displays the presentation as it will appear to the audience, starting with slide 1 regardless of which slide is displayed.

7. Themes Themes are used to maintain a consistent look throughput a presentation. A theme changes the colors, fonts, backgrounds, and layouts of placeholders.

8. Special Effects Slide transitions – the manner in which a new slide appears on the screen during a slide show Animations – the way an element on the slide (text or graphic) appears one at a time on the slide in a special way or with a sound effect. Progressive disclosure – technique where each element appears one at a time after the slide background appears.

9. Printing Print what option: Slides: prints one slide per page. Handouts: prints the indicated number of miniature slides on each page. Handouts of 3 slides per page include lines for taking notes next to each slide. Notes page: prints one slide in the top half of each page and any text that was typed in the notes pane in the bottom half of the presentation. Outline view prints the outline of the presentation as it appears in the outline tab in normal view.

10. Graphics Graphics can be used to make a presentation more interesting and capture the attention of the audience. Sometimes graphics needs to be sized Sizing handles - small circles and squares that appear at each corner and on each side of the active box