Introduction to Microsoft PowerPoint 2010

A new section of each course starts monthly. If enrolling in a series of two or more courses, please be sure to space the start date for each course at least two months apart.

All courses run for six weeks, with a two-week grace period at the end. Two lessons are released each week for the six-week duration of the course. You do not have to be present when lessons are released. You will have access to all lessons until the course ends. However, the interactive discussion area that accompanies each lesson will automatically close two weeks after the lesson is released. As such, we strongly recommend that you complete each lesson within two weeks of its release.

The final exam will be released on the same day as the last lesson. Once the final exam has been released, you will have two weeks to complete all of your course work, including the final exam.

Lesson 1

The PowerPoint 2010 Interface

Come explore the basic features of Microsoft PowerPoint 2010! You'll learn about the Ribbon, which replaces the menu and toolbars so common in other programs written for the Windows operating system. You'll find out how to plan a presentation and start the PowerPoint program. And you'll practice working with different views, task panes, tabs, and templates.

Creating Presentations

Now that you know the basics of PowerPoint, it's time to create a presentation from scratch. You'll start by choosing a theme for the presentation and slide layouts. You'll find out about the Live Preview feature and how to save a file so you can find it later. You'll also create and edit slides in the slide pane and the Outline tab. Finally, the lesson will go over the ways to put on a slide show.

Working With Table Slides

Including tables in your presentation lets you present a lot of information in a little space. In this lesson, you'll add, revise, and reformat tables. You'll also learn multiple ways to open a presentation. Then, the lesson will teach you how to preserve different versions of your work by using different filenames.

Creating and Printing Error-Free Presentations

This lesson will cover two topics: printing and proofreading. You'll learn to print your presentation as slides, handouts, an outline, and notes pages. This versatility will really help you connect with audience members! And to make sure your printed presentation is as close to perfect as it can be, you'll explore the spelling checker, the AutoCorrect feature, the Research task pane, and the thesaurus.

Using Media Clips

You're going to switch gears in this lesson and work with images instead of text, which you'll probably enjoy. You'll see how to embellish your slides with media clips, which could include illustrations, clip art, photographs, videos, or audio clips. You'll even learn how to download an image from a website and insert the image on a slide.

WordArt, Shapes, and SmartArt

You're going to work with WordArt, Shapes, and SmartArt objects in this lesson, which will be exciting. It's fun to transform text into colorful WordArt objects and to draw and fill shapes with color and special effects. You'll learn to group and edit the objects you create. And you'll add visual sophistication to your slides with SmartArt features—including Venn diagrams, flow charts, and more.

Creating and Editing a Chart

In this lesson, you'll create and edit a chart slide to illustrate statistical data. You'll find this lesson easy if you like working with numbers! But if you don't enjoy math, that's okay—the lesson will walk you through everything you need to know and do to create a chart slide. You'll also learn how to change the look of your chart by using Shape Fill, Shape Outline, and Shape Effects.

Making Global Changes

Making the same changes to dozens of PowerPoint slides is boring and time-consuming. In this lesson, you'll look at global changes you can make to your slides, handouts, and notes. For example, if you want to increase or decrease the font size on all the slides in a presentation, just make the change on the Slide Master. You also make global changes when you modify your presentation's theme colors or background.

Creating Links

In this lesson, you'll work with hyperlinks and action buttons. You'll enliven your presentation as you learn to create links from text or objects to other slides, presentations, documents, and web pages. You can even add sounds and 3D effects!

Applying Animation to Slides

Have you seen a presentation where text, images, or entire slides fly in from the top or push up from the bottom? That's animation. In this lesson, you'll learn about slide transitions, and you'll apply animation to individual slides and the Slide Master. You'll also find out how to add sound effects, such as chimes and whooshes. And perhaps most important, you'll learn how to avoid overdoing these effects!

Applying Advanced Animation Effects

You already know how to apply animation to your slides as they transition. Now it's time to apply advanced animation effects to text and objects on individual slides and Slide Masters. With the animation commands and the Animation Pane, you'll add and reorder animated text and objects on slides. You'll also add sound clips to your presentation.

Sharing and Saving Your Presentations

Now that you know so much about creating PowerPoint presentations, you'll focus on different ways to save and share them. You'll see how easy it is to make your presentation into a PDF file, so it'll be accessible on computers that don't have PowerPoint 2010. You'll learn to open, edit, and share your presentation online with a Windows Live account and then turn your presentation into a video.