Presentation expert and author of "Beyond Bullet Points," Cliff Atkinson suggests keeping most of the notes hidden from your audience when you use PowerPoint. Atkinson says that "when you use an image on a slide as a visual mnemonic, you can make your ideas, as well as the presentation, memorable." That doesn't mean, however, that you should eschew notes altogether. You can keep track of your points and even create handouts from notes within PowerPoint.
1. Open PowerPoint and launch the presentation for which you want to take notes.
2. Click in the area below the slide, where it says "Click to Add Notes," and start typing your notes. The notes are associated with that slide, so you need to select each slide individually to enter the notes you want associated with it.
3. Change the formatting for the notes text as desired, using the tools in the Font and Paragraph section of the Home tab. These changes affect any printouts you create from the notes, however, no formatting is applied to notes in Presenter View.
4. Click the "View" tab and then choose "Notes Page" to see your presentation formatted as handouts. This view allows you to format the slides and notes like a document. Scroll up and down to see the different slide-note pages.
5. Set PowerPoint to display your notes when you give a presentation. Click on the "Slide Show" tab and then check the box next to "Use Presenter View" on the right side of the ribbon. By default the presentation displays on the projector, while your computer displays your notes, a preview of the slide being projected and a list of upcoming slides.
- Change the layout of the Notes View by editing the Notes Master. Click "Notes Master" from the View tab to make your changes.
- Print handouts from your notes. Click "File," "Print" and then click the drop-down menu under Slides. Choose "Notes Pages."
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