Non-linear Slide Show Presentations

Presentations don't always go as planned. An audience member asks a question that either needs more explanation than you planned for, or that in you plan to explore a little later. Can you prepare for this? Yes!

There are several ways. If you are not sure of your audience's level of knowledge, you can prepare slides that can be shown if needed, or ignored depending on the audience. You can also change the order of your presentation just as if you were using old-fashioned overheads - but much more easily! Either way, however, requires planning!

When planning the presentation (It is hoped first by outlining on paper, supplemented with brief information on a slide so that you can rearrange the slides in the slide sorter view before filling in what you want on each slide.) identify topics where more information might be needed.

As you struggle to organize the topic you will be aware of areas that are hard to place in a linear fashion, that is, where mention of something is likely to trigger a question about a related topic that you were planning to discuss later.

In either case, you can use the titles of the slides in the outline view to plan for any digressions from the original plan. To allow yourself instant access to any slide, print the outline so you will have the number of each slide at your fingertips.

During the presentation you can access any slide in the presentation by entering the number of the slide followed by the Enter key. You may want to jot down the numbers of the slide that you left, and then the numbers of the slides that you have shown.

You can also hide certain slides (Use help to discover how), then if you want to show these slides, just enter the first number of the segment followed by the enter key. Just know the slide number to which you wish to return!

Print the outline

Preparation

For a slide to be identified with a name when printing it is necessary for the slide to have a title. Sometimes, however, you do not want a title on the slide itself. To overcome this create a title, but change it's color to match the background. If that is impossible because you can't match the background color, make the font as small as possible, and drag it off the slide. It will not show up in slide view, but will be in the outline and will probably also be visible in the normal view, but off the slide.

To print

Be sure you are in the normal view or the view that shows both the slides and the left column with tabs for both outline and slides are visible. (In 2007, if this is not the view, click View, and in the left hand part of the ribbon click Normal).
Click the Outline tab to be sure the outlines are visible.
If you want more than the title to show and print, right click in the outline tab and select Expand.
1. In 2003, first select all the titles, by tapping Ctrl+A while in the outline tab.
2. In 2007, select expand all from the menu.
Access Print Preview
1. In 2003, on the File menu click Print Preview
2. in 2007, click the Office Button in the upper left corner and click Print Preview.
In the Print What box, click Outline View
On the Print Preview toolbar, click Print

After printing you may want to color certain segments of the outline with a high lighter to easily identify the topics during the presentation.