Making a "Printable" PowerPoint Presentation for Your Students

By Candace Warner

Many of us are now making our PowerPoint presentations and lecture notes available for students. This is especially useful to students if you use a lot of outside material like graphs and charts that are not available in the textbook. There are a couple of ways instructors are doing this.

Saving PowerPoint Presentations as Web Pages

Some instructors are saving their PowerPoint presentations as a Web Page and then students can view the PowerPoint online in WebCT or another online format. One problem that I have heard about with this method is when students go to print these presentations, they are printing many black pages (which, of course, is wasting paper). So if you use this method of displaying your PowerPoint presentations, be sure and tell your students to print it off this way:

  • When they open up the PowerPoint presentation in WebCT, the outline will be on the left with a black background.

  • First, click on the “envelope” icon at the bottom of the screen to EXPAND the outline so that you can see all of the text on the slides (the pictures will not show up on the outline but will on the screen)

  • Once the PowerPoint has been expanded, highlight the outline by “left-clicking” the mouse and then dragging the mouse all the way down so that all of the text is highlighted.

  • When all of the text is highlighted, RIGHT click on the mouse, and choose PRINT.

  • Choosing this option will allow the students to print out the actual outline, while viewing the PowerPoint on-screen in its entirety.

  • If students try to print the PowerPoint and do not select the text, they will just print off black pages.

    Converting PowerPoint Presentations into an Adobe Document

    PowerPoint presentations can be converted into an Adobe document, and this is useful for a couple of reasons:

  1. No other special programs are required (Microsoft Word, PowerPoint, etc)….as long as the viewer has access to the Internet and downloads the free version of Adobe, they can view the document

  2. Putting the document into Adobe preserves the document exactly as you would want someone to view it (thus more secure and no crazy print offs that don’t look anything like what you created).

Putting the document into Adobe is not only easier for students (viewing, printing, etc), I think it's much easier on the instructor as well. The catch is, you need the full version of Adobe Acrobat Professional on your computer in order to convert documents into the Adobe format. Contact Information Technology for more information on having this program installed on your computer.

Typically what I do is finish my PowerPoint presentation and then post a version of this presentation as a HANDOUT for students to view and print from WebCT. I usually do the “3 slides per page” handout so that students can take additional notes.

If you have the full version of Adobe, and want to try this...here's what you do:

  • When you have the PowerPoint presentation open, click on File, then Print, as if you are going to print the presentation.
    (*Note: all of these steps are in the Print section but you are actually converting the document into Adobe rather than literally printing it.)

  • You will see the Printer Name dropdown box, which shows you several places where you can print the document. Typically, you will see the name of the printer you usually use to print all of your documents.

  • If you click on the dropdown arrow and scroll down, you will also see Adobe PDF....choose this option.

  • Below the Printer Name dropdown box, you will see other options for printing:

    • Print What—this box lets you choose whether you want the viewer to print off slides or handouts (I always choose handouts)

    • Color/Grayscale--I always choose color…even if the student does not have a color printer, they can still view the document in color and print it out in grayscale.

  • I also typically check the boxes that say “Scale to Fit Paper” and “Frame Slides” because I think this makes your PowerPoint look better.

  • After choosing all options, you can choose Print Preview to see what the handout will look like.

  • Once you click OK, your PowerPoint will convert into an Adobe document rather than printing.

  • This process takes a few moments, so be patient (it really is doing something although it seems like it’s not) and you will also be asked where you want to save your document, etc.

  • Remember during this process that your document is not really printing, it’s converting the PowerPoint into Adobe, but follow the steps as if you are printing it.

  • Below is a visual of what this Print Window will look like:

     


    Candace Warner
    ___________________________________________

    Candace Warner
    Assistant Professor of Sociology
    Sociology Lead Faculty
    Columbia State Community College
    Phone: 931.540.2775
    Email: warner@columbiastate.edu
    Faculty Website: http://cwarner2.columbiastate.edu 
    Dept. Website: http://www.columbiastate.edu/sociology