How to Learn to Give Excellent Microsoft PowerPoint Presentations
Microsoft's PowerPoint software is the most widely used presentation software in the world (see Reference 2) and is the most likely to be on your work computer. Learning how to effectively use the tools in Microsoft PowerPoint is something you can do with a bit of time and effort. It is a complicated piece of software, but the myriad online tutorials make it accessible to anyone.
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Instructions
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Open Microsoft PowerPoint and you will be presented with a new, blank presentation. From here you can add graphics, text, animation, and video to craft a presentation. Begin by learning where the different commands and options are located. In older versions of PowerPoint (2003 and previous) they use a menu system with choices such as "File," "View" and "Edit." In newer versions of PowerPoint (2007 and newer) they use a dynamic tab system that gives you options as you need them. Click around to see what options are available.
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Watch excellent presenters to get ideas for how you would like to use PowerPoint. Jot down some notes about what makes an effective presentation, in your mind. Once you have a good list of skills you can then focus on learning how to accomplish them in PowerPoint.
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Find tutorials that cover the skills you wish to learn. Microsoft has a thorough training site (available in the Resources section of this article along with other PowerPoint tutorial sites). Find the version of Microsoft Office you are using and then click on the PowerPoint link under that heading. You will be presented with a list of tutorials that you can match to the skills you wish to learn.
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Tips & Warnings
Practice your presentations before you give them. Check to make sure that the computer that will be running your presentation will work like the computer you used to design the slides. Find out if you will be advancing the slides on your own or if someone will be assisting you.
