Microsoft PowerPoint 2007 in the Classroom

About This Course

What teacher couldn't use some help motivating students and keeping their interest? This course will show you how to create captivating lessons and attention-grabbing classroom presentations using Microsoft PowerPoint 2007. You'll see how using PowerPoint helps you address different learning styles, making it much easier to engage a variety of learners.

First, we'll cover the basics of this MS Office program including creating slides, using templates, inserting text, changing background colors, creating WordArt titles, and adding slide transitions. Then you'll develop advanced skills such as inserting graphics, sound, video, custom animations, timed transitions, and hyperlinks.

We'll walk step-by-step through several different types of classroom presentations, including lectures and interactive narrations for your students' independent use on computer stations. By the end of the course, you'll be able to publish your presentation on a school Web site or even take your PowerPoint shows on the road. Along the way, we'll talk about how you can help your students develop their own PowerPoint and presentation skills.

So get ready to discover why PowerPoint can be such a fun and motivational tool that adds appeal to any classroom subject!

About The Instructor

This course includes a knowledgeable and caring instructor who will guide you through your lessons, facilitate discussions, and answer your questions. The instructor for this course will be Tracy Loffer.

Tracy Loffer holds a Master's degree in Education in Curriculum and Instruction. She has been involved in education for twenty years, as a music educator and technology trainer of students and teachers. She has also worked in the private sector as a trainer of domestic and international technology franchisees as well as a writer and developmental editor of educational technology materials using Office and Publisher.

Syllabus

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.

Week 1

Wednesday - Lesson 01

Do you have students in your classroom with different learning styles? In our first lesson, we'll explore the ways that Microsoft PowerPoint 2007 can help you teach all kinds of students. We'll view two different types of PowerPoint presentations that you can use in a classroom setting, and we'll also look at some helpful PowerPoint templates and slide layouts.

Friday - Lesson 02

In this lesson, you'll learn about the Office Button, the Ribbon, Tabs, and Task Groups in PowerPoint, and what all of them do. You'll have an opportunity to explore different functions in the Task Groups using a presentation template. We'll also work with the Clipboard, Font, and Drawing groups. You'll create some basic slides and learn about different slide views. In addition, we'll explore objects on slides and how to move, resize, and delete them. This will give you a great foundation for beginning your own presentations.

Week 2

Wednesday - Lesson 03

Today, you'll learn about adding, formatting, and manipulating text in PowerPoint. You'll insert text boxes; experiment with different colors, fonts, and styles; and add bullets to important information. In addition, we'll explore WordArt, which will help you add colors, patterns, and fill effects to WordArt titles. To polish up our text, we'll take a look at alignments, colors, and placements, and we'll finish with a Spelling and Grammar Check.

Friday - Lesson 04

Have you heard of JPEGs, GIFs, and BMPs, and wondered what these letters mean? Well, wonder no more! In this lesson, you'll learn the origins and purposes of different graphic formats. You'll look at the Picture Tools and practice applying effects to pictures. Finally, we'll explore sources of clip art, and you'll see how to use options on the Insert tab to add images from scanners and digital cameras. By the end of this lesson, you'll be able to add all kinds of images to your presentations!

Week 3

Wednesday - Lesson 05

Do you enjoy drawing shapes and experimenting with fill colors? Can you think of some ways you could use shapes in a PowerPoint presentation to teach concepts in class? Today, we'll continue our exploration of the Drawing group. We'll look at Shapes, Shape Fill, Outline, line and arrow styles, SmartArt, and 3-D effects. You'll have fun rotating, flipping, and distributing objects on your slides.

Friday - Lesson 06

You might think of PowerPoint as a great way to make visual presentations in your classroom, but you can do a lot with audio, too! Today, you'll discover how to locate, save, and insert sound files from the Internet. And wouldn't it be great to customize a presentation with your own voice? You'll also learn how to record and add your own sounds and narration to a PowerPoint presentation.

Week 4

Wednesday - Lesson 07

Would you like to know how to play a video in a PowerPoint presentation? In this lesson, we'll explore different video formats, as well as sources of videos and motion clips. You'll learn how to set up a link to a video to either play with a click or play automatically in a slide show. You'll be surprised at how easy it is to add educational clips to your presentations!

Friday - Lesson 08

Have you noticed all the transitions that you hear or see every day on radio and television? Transitions help us move seamlessly from one idea to the next. In today's lesson, you'll learn how to make your slide show more interesting and exciting by using the many visual and auditory transitions available in PowerPoint.

Week 5

Wednesday - Lesson 09

Putting objects in motion is one sure way to get your students' attention! Today, you'll discover how animating text and graphics in your PowerPoint shows can help you bring any show to life. You can animate objects in a PowerPoint presentation with a wide variety of motions and sounds. We'll practice animating objects and see which effects work best in your show.

Friday - Lesson 10

Have you ever wanted to create a self-paced presentation to show students at a computer station? In today's lesson, you'll create an interactive slide show that allows your students to explore information at their own pace. You'll also learn how to design a home slide with hyperlinks to as many individual slides as you need.

Week 6

Wednesday - Lesson 11

If you've ever given a speech, you know how helpful speaking notes are. Did you know that you can add notes to a PowerPoint presentation to help you give a talk that goes with it? You'll learn how to do that today, and you'll also create handouts to go with your slide show. In addition, we'll practice using the Rehearse Timings option to set up a show to automatically advance. You'll see how all these tools can make presenting your shows a snap!

Friday - Lesson 12

Have you ever wanted to give a presentation in another classroom or at a conference, but you weren't sure how to get it to a different computer? In our final lesson, you'll see how PowerPoint's Package for CD feature allows you to take your slide show wherever you want! You'll also learn how to e-mail a presentation, and how to save a slide show as a Web page. Get ready to share your presentations just about anywhere!

Requirements

Microsoft Windows Vista or XP, Microsoft PowerPoint 2007 or Microsoft PowerPoint Home and Student 2007 or Microsoft Office 2007 (the Home and Student Edition or the Standard Edition or the Professional Edition or the Small Business Edition are all acceptable). Please be sure to install the software on your computer before the course begins; Internet access, e-mail, the Microsoft Internet Explorer or Mozilla Firefox Web browser, and the Adobe Flash and PDF plug-ins (two free and simple downloads you obtain at http://www.adobe.com/downloads by clicking Get Adobe Flash Player and Get Adobe Reader). This course is not suitable for Macintosh users, nor for users of older versions of Microsoft PowerPoint.