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You are here: Home / Design / Animation & transitions / Highlight important words

Highlight important words

April 14, 2004 by Ellen Finkelstein 2 Comments

READ LATER - DOWNLOAD THIS POST AS PDF >> CLICK HERE <<

Slides with lots of text on them are hard for audiences to comprehend quickly. There’s just too much information. Either people listen to the presenter and ignore the slide, or more likely (and worse), they read the slide and ignore the presenter.

The brain simply has difficulty listening to one set of words while reading another set. Also, studies show that people tend to skim what they read on screen (as opposed to what they read on paper); therefore, they miss many of the words.

The best solution is to put fewer words on a slide. It’s easy to divide one slide into three, for example. Another important technique is to edit ruthlessly, removing any unnecessary words.

However, if you feel that you need to put a lot of text on a slide, you can help your audience get the most out of it by making key words stand out. Here are two techniques to highlight important words.

Use a different color for key words

An easy technique is to use a different color for key words. People quickly get the point by skimming these words. Simply select the key words and choose another color by clicking the Font Color button on the on the mini toolbar or the Home tab.

different color for key words

different color for key words

Animate a filled rectangle behind the words

Another method is to use custom animation to display a filled rectangle behind the key words. Follow these steps:

  1. Choose Insert tab> Shapes> Rectangle.
  2. Drag across some key words to cover them with the rectangle.
  3. Remove the outline. To remove the outline, on the Format tab, use the Shape Outline button in the Shape Styles group, and choose No Outline.
  4. Specify the fill of the rectangle. The color needs to be a strong contrast from the text, yet show up against the background. Use the Shape Fill button and choose an appropriate color.
  5. Choose Animations> Custom Animation in PowerPoint 2007. In 2010 and later click the Animations tab.
  6. Choose Add Effect or Add Animation> Entrance> Wipe.  You can choose any entrance animation you want, but keep it mild. A Fade animation is also nice.
  7. Set the parameters for the animation at the top of the Custom Animation task pane or from the ribbon’s Effect Options drop-down list. For Wipe, set it to wipe From Left. I used Fast for the Speed setting. I left the On Click setting so that I could control the timing as I was speaking.
  8. Right-click the rectangle, and choose Send to Back.
  9. Test the animation in Slide Show view. Here you see the result after 2 clicks.
If you found this useful, you’ll also find another technique for highlighting important words with SmartArt valuable. Check it out in my blog post, “My latest SmartArt faves.”
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What are you using to help your audience navigate through the maze of text? Leave a comment! And please share using the Share buttons below, because lots of presenters will find this helpful.

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READ LATER - DOWNLOAD THIS POST AS PDF >> CLICK HERE <<

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Filed Under: Animation & transitions, Content, Text & fonts Tagged With: animation, highlight words, key words, presentations, slides, Tab list

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Craig Hadden (@RemotePoss)Elly Recent comment authors
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Elly
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Elly

For highlighting another way is to select the text you want, go to Format, and click on text effects. Then click on glow and pick the colour..

or

[IMG]http://i43.tinypic.com/2wr2cfo.png[/IMG]

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11 years ago
Craig Hadden (@RemotePoss)
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Craig Hadden (@RemotePoss)

That’s a good point about not being a workaround for having too much text on the slide.

Here’s a 3-minute video showing how to use a 3rd method, which puts a yellow background on the text (like you can in Word). As with your first method, the advantage is that when you edit or move the text, the formatting stays with it.

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9 years ago
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