Old Greeks: A Mini-tutorial In Power Point 2003

 

            This tutorial is written for a PC with a Windows XP operating system.  All the tools and commands used in this tutorial come from the Power Point 2003 version, but the tools and commands in a slightly newer or slightly older version would be the same or very similar.  When in doubt, consult Help on the Menu Bar. 

 

            Some introductions: a “slide” is the basic unit of Power Point, and each slide could possibly include text, audio, video, photographs, animations, spreadsheet, or most anything else your computer is capable of doing; this short tutorial creates a presentation of three slides; you will be able to create a simple Power Point slide show when this tutorial is over, but there is a longer, much more detailed tutorial available in the Lab.

 

I.  Preparations

 

            (1) Open Power Point. If the icon for the Power Point program is on your Desktop, place the mouse arrow on top of the icon and double-click.  If you don’t have an icon on your Desktop, click on Start > All Programs > Microsoft Office > Microsoft Office Power Point 2003.

 

            (2) Clean The Screen.  On the right side of your screen, you should see a big, vertical thing called a Task Pane.  It probably has the title of Getting Started, and it has its own Close (X as usual) and other commands.  Close it, and that will increase your workspace.  On the left side of the screen is a Slide Editor.  Leave it alone. There is an example of an opening screen at the end of this tutorial.

 

II.  Slide #1

 

            (1) The opening screen has a generic slide.  Don’t use it.  Instead, go up to the Menu Bar, click on Format > Slide Design, and the Slide Design Task Pane appears.  

 

            (2) In the list of designs scroll almost to the bottom until you can see and double-click on Layers.  Your generic slide changes a lot.  For the better.  Close the Task Pane.

 

            (3) Click where it says “Click to add title.”  A blinking cursor appears, surrounded by what is called a Text Box.  Type: Old Greeks

 

            (4) Click where it says “Click to add subtitle.”  A blinking cursor and text box appear. Type: SP: to inform my audience about the [press Enter on keyboard] origins of the Olympic Games.

 

            (5) Select the title of Old Greeks [if you don’t know how to do this, you move the mouse arrow to the beginning or end of the text, hold down the left button of the mouse, and sweep across the text until it is highlighted].

 

            (6) Go up to the Standard Toolbar and click on the icon with the flyout label of Copy, or click Edit > Copy on the Menu Bar.  The title is now in the Windows Clipboard.  Click anywhere away from the titles to deselect them.

 

III.  Slide #2

 

            [If you haven’t already done so, create a file for this slide show with  File > Save.  Save additional work as you go along by clicking on the Save icon on the Formatting Toolbar.]

 

            (1) On the Menu Bar, click Format > Slide Layout, and the Slide Layout Task Pane appears.

 

            (2) Find the Title and Text example near the top of the list.  Right-click with the mouse arrow in the middle of the example, and in the menu that appears choose Insert New Slide.  A new slide based on that layout appears on your screen.

 

            (3) Click where it says Click to add title, and the cursor and box appear again. 

 

            (4) On the Standard Toolbar, click on the Paste icon or click Edit > Paste on the Menu Bar, and the title of your slide show appears.

 

            (5) Click where it says Click to add text, and the text box appears again.  The cursor should be right after a little gray square called a bullet.  If not, click to put it there.

 

            (6) Type: Games began in 76 BC

 

            (7) Double space, and notice the next bullet appears automatically.  Type: Olympia small, religious center of Greece

 

            (8) Double space and type: Participants nude, lots of gambling

 

            (9) Move the mouse arrow to directly in front of the first word of the first line, the G, and click to get a cursor.  Then right-click to see a menu, and choose Bullets and Numbering.

 

            (10) In the Bullets and Numbering dialog box, click on the arrowheads example (2^nd row, 3^rd column), change Size to 100% of text if not already changed, and choose the Color: of Red. Click OK, and your first bullet should change to a red arrowhead.

 

            (11) Use the same procedure to change the second and third bullets.  Click away from the text to deselect the text box.

 

SAVE

 

IV.  Slide #3

 

            (1) In the Slide Layout Task Pane, find the example of Title and Content (about four down in the left column). Right-click on it to see a menu, and choose Insert New Slide. A new slide with the same layout and design appears on your screen.

 

            (2) Click where it says Click to add title, then click on the Paste icon or Edit > Paste.  The title of Old Greeks appears in your title line.

 

            (3) In the gray box in the middle of the content area, there are six small icons.  Find the icon with the label of Insert Chart, and click on that little icon.  A bar chart and Datasheet appear.

 

            (4) The mouse arrow has changed shape to a thick little cross.  Notice that the first cell of the Datasheet is selected (it has a thick black line all around the cell).  Type: 10.75 The new numbers replace the old ones, and you don’t have to delete the old numbers, just select the cell.

 

            (5) Click on the next cell down to select it, and type 22.5, then type 40.45 in the third cell after you select it.

 

            (6) The Datasheet has a letter at the top of each column.  Click on D, and the entire column is selected.  Press the Delete key on your keyboard, and the entire column is deleted.

 

            (7) Notice that the bars up top have changed.  On the new Menu Bar, click on Chart > Chart Type,  and the Chart Type dialog box appears.

 

            (8) In the directories of Chart Type: click on Pie, and six examples appear.  Click on the example with three separate pieces (usually 2^nd row, 1^st column).  Click OK, and your chart changes to your specifications.  Click somewhere away from the content to deselect and finish.

 

V.  Special Effects

 

            (1) In the Slide Editor on the left of your screen, click on the image of the first slide.  You can tell you have selected a slide when you see a heavy dark border around it.

 

            (2) Right-click the slide image, and in the menu that appears choose Slide Transition.  The Slide Transition dialog box appears.

 

            (3) Under Apply to selected slides, choose Box Out and set the Speed: at Medium.  Select the 2^nd slide and choose Push Down, Slow.  Select the 3^rd slide and choose Push Up, Slow.

 

            (4) Select the image of the 2^nd slide, and click anywhere on the text after a bullet.  The text box appears around all the text.  Select the first line of text.

            (5) When the line of text is selected, right-click on it.  A short menu appears. Choose Custom Animation. The Custom Animation dialog box opens.

 

            (6) Click on Add Effect and choose Entrance.  Under Entrance choose Fly In, then choose the settings of Start: On click, Direction: From left, and Speed: Fast. Follow the same procedure and choose the same settings for the 2^nd and 3^rd lines of text.  Click away to deselect.

 

VI.  Playing and Transporting the Show

 

            Select the image of the first slide.  Look at the left bottom area of your screen, and notice the third little icon has the flyout label of Slide Show from current slide.  Click on it.  Your slide show begins. [Or go to the Menu Bar and click on Slide Show > View Show.] You should see, after a special effect, the first slide across all of your screen.  Click again to get the next slide to appear, after its transition, and click again for each line of text in the second slide.  The third slide displays like the others, and the screen goes to black when your show is over.

 

            One thing not covered in this tutorial could be important to you.  Insert is on the Menu Bar, and when you click on it you get a menu of choices such as picture, movies and sounds (spoken word or music), files, and other things you could insert into a slide. You can even lay down a sound track for the entire slide show. 

 

            You can print your slides, or some of them, and use them as handouts for your audience.  Click on File > Print Preview to choose the number of slides you want to print on hardcopy.

 

            The size of your slide show is relatively small and can fit on a floppy.  You could even go up to six or seven slides and still get it all on a floppy. After your last save, copy the show to the A: drive, the floppy, for convenient transportation.  You could also burn a CD copy, but that would waste a lot of space.  If you use the floppy in a computer attached to a projector, for a class, for example, make sure you allow for lots of practice time.  If you wait until the last moment, something will inevitably go wrong that you don’t know how to fix. That’s life.

 

            A good slide show can make a good impression and be a real service to a speech or lecture, but a slide show that doesn’t work or breaks down is worse than no show at all.