Teaching your students about PowerPoint 03 and 07

Have you ever assigned a project that required your students to use PowerPoint?  I would guess that you have.  Sometimes you get back these awesome presentations with sound, movie clips, hyperlinks, slide transitions, animation, and more.  Sometimes you don’t.  Now, you can help all of your students gain the skills necessary to create interesting and professional looking PowerPoint presentations.  Take your students to the computer lab to look at some of the self-paced tutorials that we have here at GCFLearnFree.org.   The students can create a user account to view all of our lessons.  Once they have done this, have the students follow the links below for help with their PowerPoint presentations.

For PowerPoint 2003:

• If you click on this link, PP03, then you can look at a whole list of self-paced lessons on how to use PowerPoint 2003.  There are even videos that take you through the process, step by step.
• If your students need help with adding Clip Art, send them here: http://www.gcflearnfree.org/computer/lesson.aspx?id=928
• If they need help adding charts, diagrams or tables then you could view this link: http://www.gcflearnfree.org/computer/lesson.aspx?id=929
• If your students need help adding an AutoShape, WordArt, or Hyperlinks send them here: http://www.gcflearnfree.org/computer/lesson.aspx?id=930
• For help animating slides check out this lesson: http://www.gcflearnfree.org/computer/lesson.aspx?id=931
• If you want to add slide transitions, then look at this link for help: http://www.gcflearnfree.org/computer/lesson.aspx?id=934

For PowerPoint 2007:

• If you click on this link, PP07, then you will find a list of self-paced lessons that explain how to use PowerPoint 2007.  There are is also a quiz you can take under the “Test your knowledge” section.
• If your students need help with adding Clip Art or Pictures, send them here: http://www.gcflearnfree.org/computer/lesson.aspx?id=1456
• If they want to learn how to use WordArt and Shapes, then click here: http://www.gcflearnfree.org/computer/lesson.aspx?id=1461
• For help with adding movies, click here: http://www.gcflearnfree.org/computer/lesson.aspx?id=1464
• You can even add sounds.  Learn how to do this here: http://www.gcflearnfree.org/computer/lesson.aspx?id=1465
• Text and objects can be animated easily.  Learn how here: http://www.gcflearnfree.org/computer/lesson.aspx?id=1466
• Make professional business presentations with SmartArt illustrations: http://www.gcflearnfree.org/computer/lesson.aspx?id=1469
• Action Buttons and Hyperlinks can connect your PowerPoint to the web: http://www.gcflearnfree.org/computer/lesson.aspx?id=1470&p=1
• For help figuring out what font size to use, check out this blog and video: http://blog.gcflearnfree.org/2008/10/03/powerpoint-how-to-choose-a-font-size/

While the above links are great classroom tools, I realize that getting a group of students into the computer lab is not always feasible.  Here is a tip for getting around it:

• You, the teacher, creates an account
• Go to the lesson links above.
• Click on the “Print” button, in the top right hand corner of the page.
• This will make the entire lesson viewable all at once.  You will not have to click through a series of pages.
• Print out the lessons and use them as handouts in class.  Our information is copyrighted, but we allow our lessons to be reproduced and used for educational purposes as long as the lessons are not altered or transformed in any way.  For more information on our Terms of Use, see http://www.gcflearnfree.org/home/termsofuse.aspx

We also offer online classes for PowerPoint 03 and PowerPoint 07 that offer CEUs upon completion.   There are limited seats available for our free classes so getting an entire class signed up at once is unlikely.  You could have your students sign up to take a class on their own time and show you their certificate of completion for extra credit.

These classes can benefit you, the teacher, even more!  Our classes offer CEUs which can be applied to teacher license renewal in certain states.   Just check with your Department of Public Instruction to see if you can use our CEUs in your state.  If you find out that you can use them, leave a post on the blog and let us know!  Make sure to check back frequently because I will be writing more articles about how you can use our site in the classroom!