How to PowerPoint

Most software tutorials are built using screenshots of the application or using a screencast video like those from Screenr. 

What’s cool about PowerPoint is that you can combine those techniques to create your software demos.  Or you can just build it in PowerPoint without the screencasting application.

In the post, Here Are Some Time Saving Tips for Your Next Software Demo, I wrote for the Rapid E-Learning Blog, I showed some ways that PowerPoint can be effective as an authoring tool for software demos.  You can even make them interactive, which you can see on that post.

Compared to older versions, PowerPoint 2007 makes this even more viable because you can easily right-click and swap out images.  Thus if the application’s screen changes after building your demo, it’s just a matter of right-clicking and inserting the updated images.  All of the interactivity and animations will still be intact.

Having produced hundreds of screencasts and software courses, I can tell you that PowerPoint is a very effective tool for software training.  Is it the best tool? Not always.  But for a lot of software training, it’s a good tool.  And in many cases a lot faster and easier to work with than a screencast video that requires more production (and usually a lot more editing).

Check out the blog post on the Rapid E-Learning Blog to learn more.  Be sure to watch the demo and try the interaction on the last slide.

I did a post for the Rapid E-Learning Blog where I demonstrated a simple elearning scenario.  I got a lot of emails asking how it was built. 

So I did a follow up post where I show how I actually built the elearning scenario using PowerPoint and Articulate Presenter ‘09.

View the Tutorial and Download the Free PowerPoint Files

If you use PowerPoint for elearning and you want to learn to make your courses more interactive, then you’ll get a lot of value out of the link above an this one on How I Built that E-Learning Scenario. 

Not only is there a good tutorial that goes with it, I also included the PowerPoint files so you can deconstruct how the scenario was built on your own.

The Rapid E-Learning Blog is giving away a free PowerPoint template.  In addition to the template, you get a great tutorial on how to create your own PowerPoint templates.

To view the tutorial and download the free template, go to Here’s a Free PowerPoint Template & How I Made It via the Rapid E-Learning Blog.

Check out How To Design Custom PowerPoint Templates for E-Learning (Plus 8 Free Templates) via the Rapid E-Learning Blog.

You’ll learn how to build your own PowerPoint template and you have access to download eight high quality templates free of charge.

The Rapid E-Learning Blog has two great posts on how to build custom graphics using PowerPoint.  The goal is to practice these techniques and improve your PowerPoint skills.

You’ll learn:

• to be more fluent with PowerPoint features
• rethink the graphics you can build
• new ways to illustrate the graphics you need

The posts contain quick tutorials and you can download the original PowerPoint source files.

Create Custom Icons

See How Easily You Can Create Graphics in PowerPoint by using an Illustrator tutorial as the basis for this PowerPoint tutorial.

Create a Television Monitor

Here’s How to Get Past a Screen Full of Bullet Points teaches you to create your own television monitor.  This technique could be used for a TV or computer monitor that could hold more information.

Here are three blog posts I did for the Rapid E-Learning Blog that deal with graphics and visual design.  You’ll learn how use blurred images to direct the learner’s focus and how to quickly create silhouette characters and clip art.

If you don’t have a graphics editor and want to use more than PowerPoint to build your graphics try these:

Paint.net:  Free graphics editor that lets you do most of what you need to do.

Photoshop Elements: Great alternative to the more expensive full version and does all that you need.

Change the Focus of the Image

Blur Your Course Into Focus discusses ways to use a blur filter so that you can direct the learner’s focus.

Create Silhouettes

3 Easy Ways to Create Silhouette Characters shows three ways to quickly create silhouette characters for your slides.

How to Use Silhouettes

Following up the post above, here’s 5 Ways to Use Silhouette Graphics in Your E-Learning Course.  In this post, you’ll learn different ways you can use silhouettes on your slides and in your elearning courses.

These three posts will help you build better graphics for your slides and elearning courses.

PowerPoint is a great authoring tool for elearning.  It’s easy to use and combined with a rapid elearning tool you can publish your courses quickly.  If you don’t have a Flash programmer on staff (OR want to save time and money) it’s a great way to go.  I did a presentation a while back where I outlined my elearning strategy.

Click here to view the presentation on elearning strategy.

One of the challenges, though is that many people who use PowerPoint for elearning end up creating very static and linear course.  In some cases, this is fine.  But, as a matter of practice it’s best to make your elearning courses more engaging and interactive. 

If you do want more interactivity, check out the Rapid E-Learning Blog’s post on  How to Add Scenarios to Your Rapid E-Learning Courses…Rapidly!

Click here to see one of the examples.

There are some great examples and a tutorial that walks you through the steps. so that you can build your own interactive elearning scenarios.

The cartoon above was inspired by a conference I attended.  In the session, the presenter went on and on about how PowerPoint was not effective for elearning and used PowerPoint to teach us this.

At another conference, I peeked in on a class that was teaching people how to build elearning courses.  Now the class itself wasn’t a hands-on workshop.  No, it was just a class that talked about learning and how to present ideas in an elearning context.

The irony was that this instructor had a plain white PowerPoint slide that was filled with about 15 bullet points.  You’d think that considering his use of multimedia to teach his pupils, he’d have applied some of his elearning principles to the slides he was using?  They’re not that different.

Anyway, enough of the diatribe.  Here’s a post from the Rapid E-Learning Blog that covers What Everybody Ought To Know About Using PowerPoint for
E-learning. 

As you’ll see in the demo, PowerPoint’s a very effective tool for elearning.  In fact, considering the cost, ease of use, and some of the new features in PowerPoint 2007 (and the upcoming PowerPoint 2010) I’d say that PowerPoint will continue to be the elearning tool of choice for quite a few more years.

Just to show that the critics are wrong, here are links to examples built in PowerPoint.  They were all published using the Articulate Studio ‘09.  There’s a free 30-day trial, if you’re interested in creating your own rapid elearning courses.

CPR Prototype Course

  CPR Prototype Course: This demo was built with just 20 slides.  The first slide is a Flash animation, the simulation activity is built in Articulate Quizmaker ‘09, and the rest is all PowerPoint slides.

Office Ergonomics Course

 Office Ergonomics: This example combines PowerPoint, Engage, and the older version of Quizmaker.  I like it because it shows how the rapid elearning tools can work together to create both an interactive and engaging course.

Frog Dissection Demo

Frog Dissection Demo: I built this in PowerPoint to show a person I met at a conference that you can create an interactive and engaging course. 

Beer Brewing Tour

Beer Brewing Tour: This was submitted for the Articulate Guru Awards.  I know the author.  He was a relatively new user and this was built in a couple of evenings…at a pub, of course.

Evernote Overview

 Evernote Overview:  This is a great example of nice visual design and effective use of the PowerPoint animations to teach people about Evernote’s features.  Check out the cool scroll animation in the iPhone section.

I think you’ll agree that these are excellent examples of what you can with PowerPoint.  Of course, no one’s suggesting that PowerPoint replaces sound instructional design or effective use of graphics.  But then again, PowerPoint’s just a blank screen like Flash or any other authoring environment.  If you have a beef, it’s not with PowerPoint.  Go talk to the person who’s using it to bore you to death.

Are you tired of the old standard PowerPoint templates?  Do you want to create your own, but don’t feel like you have the design skills?  Well, help is on the way.

Check out this post, The Secret to Creating Your Own PowerPoint Templates for E-Learning, from the Rapid E-Learning Blog.  It has a great tutorial on how to get design ideas for your next PowerPoint template.

Great Tips & Download 3 Free PowerPoint Templates

Not only will you get some great tips from the blog post, but you can also download three free PowerPoint templates that can be used for presentations or your rapid elearning courses.

Hope you’re inspired to create your own.  If you do, share them with us by via the comments section.

Check out the post on Understanding Multimedia for Rapid E-Learning.  While it’s about elearning, the core information is the same.

The post discusses:

• differences between vector and bitmap images
• recording audio
• use of video

There are also some good links to some free multimedia software.  Here are a couple that I use quite a bit:

• Paint.net: it’s free and it’s turned into a really nice graphics editor that does most of what people want.
• MovieMaker: Microsoft’s free video editing application.  You’re not going to make Hollywood videos with this, but it’s a very capable and easy to use editor.  Plus, most likely you already have it on your PC.  I see they even have some MovieMaker books for those who want to learn more.
• Audacity: it’s a free audio editor.  Most of the time it’s easier to record in PowerPoint or your elearning application.  But sometimes it’s good to keep the audio and other production separated.  
• Screenr: I find this to be one of the best and easiest to use screencasting tools.  It’s free and you don’t need to download any applications.  I also like that there’s no Screenr branding on the downloaded MP4 videos.