Creating Speaker Notes


Speaker notes are like handouts, but for you. Only one printout format is available for them: the Notes Pages layout. It consists of the slide on the top half (the same size as in the two-slides-per-page handout) with the blank space below it for your notes to yourself.

Speaker notes printed in PowerPoint are better than traditional note cards for several reasons. For one thing, you can type your notes right into the computer and print them out on regular paper. There's no need to jam a note card into a typewriter and use messy correction fluid or erasers to make changes. The other benefit is that each note page contains a picture of the slide, so it's not as easy to lose your place while speaking.

Typing Speaker Notes

You can type your notes for a slide in Normal view (in the notes pane), or in Notes Page view. The latter shows the page more or less as it will look when you print your notes pages; this can help if you need to gauge how much text will fit on the printed page.

To switch to Notes Page view, on the View tab click Notes Page as shown in Figure 19.11. Unlike some of the other views, there is no shortcut button for this view in the bottom-right corner of the PowerPoint window. Once you're in Notes Page view, you can zoom and scroll just like in any other view to see more or less of the page at once. You can scroll further to move from slide to slide, or you can move from slide to slide in the traditional ways (the Page Up and Page Down keys on the keyboard or the Next Slide or Previous Slide buttons on-screen).

image from book
Figure 19.11: Notes Page view is one of the best ways to work with your speaker notes.

Note 

Use the Zoom control to zoom in or out until you find the optimal view so that the text you type is large enough to be clear, but small enough so that you can see across the entire width of the note area. I find that 66 to 85 percent works well on my screen at 800×600 resolution, but yours may vary.

Just type your notes in the Notes area, the same as you would type any text box in PowerPoint. The lines in the paragraph wrap automatically. Press Enter to start a new paragraph. When you're done, move to the next slide.

Changing the Notes Page Layout

Just as you can edit your handout layouts, you can also edit your notes page layout. Just switch to its Master and make your changes. Follow these steps:

  1. On the View tab, click Notes Master.

  2. Edit the layout, as you have learned to edit other masters. See Figure 19.12. This can include:

    • Moving placeholders for the slide, the notes, or any of the header or footer elements.

    • Changing the font used for the text in any of those areas.

    • Resizing the placeholder for the slide graphic.

    • Resizing the Notes pane.

    • Adding clip art or other graphics to the background.

    • Adding a colored, textured, or patterned background to the notes page.

  3. When you are finished, click the Close Master View button to return to Normal view.

image from book
Figure 19.12: You can edit the layout of the notes pages in Notes Master view.

Printing Notes Pages

When you're ready to print your notes pages, follow these steps:

  1. Choose Office image from book Print. The Print dialog box opens.

  2. Open the Print What drop-down list and choose Notes Pages.

  3. Set any other options, just as you did when printing handouts earlier in the chapter. (If you need to choose which printer to use or to set the options for that printer, see the "Setting Printer-Specific Options" section earlier in this chapter.) There are no special options for notes pages.

  4. Click OK. The notes pages print.

Caution 

If you print notes pages for hidden slides, you may want to arrange your stack after they're printed so that the hidden slides are at the bottom. That way you won't get confused when giving the presentation.




Microsoft PowerPoint 2007 Bible
Microsoft Powerpoint 2007 Bible
ISBN: 0470144939
EAN: 2147483647
Year: 2007
Pages: 268
Authors: Faithe Wempen

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