Chapter 75 Google Slides

In addition to Google Docs for word documents and Google Sheets for spreadsheets, Google also has a web-based slide presentation editor called Google Slides. Google Slides allows users to format and edit slide presentations online and with Slide’s sharing capabilities, multiple people can edit the slides at the same time. As a data scientist, Google Slides can be a powerful tool to present your work to your employer or contribute to a presentation with your colleagues.

If you’ve ever used Microsoft Powerpoint, you can think of Slides as an online version of Powerpoint, but with the additional capability to work simultaneously with other users on the same set of slides! It is compatible with Microsoft Powerpoint files (.pptx and .ppt).

75.0.1 Presentation Guidelines

Before we talk details about how to work within Google Slides, we want to review a few best practices for slide presentation. To make a good slide show, it’s best to keep a few guidelines in mind:

  1. Minimize the number of words you put on any slide.
  2. Whenever possible, use pictures instead of words.
  3. Make sure images and text are as large as possible.
  4. Use consistent text font and colors throughout the presentation.

75.0.2 Accessing Google Slides

Like Docs and Sheets, Google Slides can be accessed from within Google Drive. To create a new presentation through Drive, simply click the “New” button in the top left corner of the Google Drive home page and then select “Google Slides.”

Slides on Google Drive

Like Docs and Sheets, however, you can also access Google Slides directly through its own URL, slides.google.com. Remember, Google Drive contains all of the files you have stored on the cloud, while Google Slides will only contain your presentation files. Your Google Slides homepage will have the same structure as for Docs and Sheets. You can see there is a TEMPLATE GALLERY at the top of the screen and recent presentations at the bottom. To start a new presentation, you can select the “Blank” option or any of the available templates.

Google Slides Page

Clicking on “TEMPLATE GALLERY” will expand the template options to include “Personal,” “Work,” and “Education” templates.

Expanded templates

Once you click on “Blank” to create a blank presentation, you can begin to type in the dotted boxes to add text to your presentation.

Adding text to Google Slides

75.0.3 Creating a Full Slideshow

So far, this lesson has covered how to open a new slide show in Google Slides and how to enter text onto your first slide. However, to create a full slideshow, you’ll want to know how to:

  • Add new slides
  • Use different slide layouts
  • Format text
  • Add and edit images
  • Change the theme and format of your slide show
  • Rearrange slide order

The remainder of this lesson will be dedicated to covering these topics.

75.0.3.1 Adding new slides

To add a new slide to your slideshow, you’ll click the plus sign at the left on the toolbar at the top of your Google Slides presentation.

New Slide

A second slide will appear in the panel at the left. The blue highlighting around around the second slide in the panel at the left indicates that that slide is the slide being displayed on the right.

New Slide highlighted in blue at left

You may notice that this slide has a different layout than the first slide. The first slide had a large text box for the title. This slide, however, has a a text box for a title along the top and a large text box covering the rest of the slide. Google Slides is taking its best guess as to what type of slide you may want; however, you can always state which slide layout you want explicitly.

75.0.3.2 Changing layouts

If the slide layout being displayed is not the slide layout you want, this can be easily changed by clicking on the “Layout” icon from the toolbar.

Layout icon

There are a number of different layouts from which you can choose, depending upon your needs. For example, you might only need a caption for a large image, so you could select the “Caption” layout choice. Click on the layout you’d like to use and the slide will change to the layout you’ve selected. You can always change the layout again if the one you’ve chosen doesn’t work well. As you gain experience making presentations, you will know which layouts work well for you!

select layout menu

75.0.3.3 Formatting text

As you start to add text to slides, you’ll quickly realize that the icons along the top and steps required are the same as they were in Google Docs. This is by design. Google has designed its suite of products so that once you master a skill in one of its products, you can use it in its other products. That said, you already know how to format text from the Google Docs lesson, so we won’t go over that here.

Process for formatting text is the same across Google Products

While the process for formatting text is the same, the one thing that differs between Google Docs and Google Slides is the fact that the positioning of the text box in Google Slides is important (and something you didn’t have to consider in Google Docs). To re-position a text box in Google slides, you’ll first click on the text box. Then, by hovering over the blue highlighted border around the text box, you will see a cross made of arrows appear. Once this arrow cross appears, you click and hold down. While still holding down, you can drag the text box to the the position on the slide where you want the box. Once the text is where you want it, you can release. The text box will now be wherever you’ve dropped the text box on the slide.

75.0.3.4 Adding and editing images

To add images to a slideshow, the process is again the same as in Google Docs, and the process for re-positioning an image on the slide is the same as was just discussed. However, in Google Slides, you’ll likely be editing the size and appearance of images to a greater extent than you would need to in Google Docs. We’ll discuss how to work with images in Google Slides here.

75.0.3.4.1 Cropping an image

Consider the following image in Google Slides. Notice that the blue box around the outside of the image is much larger than the actual image we’re interested in using. To crop out this extra white space, you’ll want to first click on the icons, you’ll select the crop icon.

Crop icon

The outline around the image will now have black bars around it.

Remove whitespace from image

These black bars can be dragged to the position where you’d like the image to be.

Remove whitespace from image

After the image is the size you want it to be, hit ‘Enter’ or click away from the image on your screen. The image has now been cropped, as indicated by the now-smaller blue outline on the image!

cropped image

75.0.3.4.2 Aligning objects

In addition to adding images, often you’ll want to be sure that images on your slides are aligned so that they look good when you go to present the information. Google Slides makes that pretty easy to do. To align images, you’ll drag your cursor over the objects to select all the objects you want to align. Once selected, you’ll right click on the selected objects to display a menu. You’ll then use the “Align horizontally” and “Align vertically” options to align the objects the way you want them.

Aligning objects

75.0.3.5 Additional formatting options

Additional formatting options can be explored by right-clicking on the image that will show a menu with additional options or by clicking on the additional image-editing icons on the toolbar.

Additional formatting options

75.0.3.6 Formatting and editing themes

In addition to formatting individual text boxes and images on your slides, you may want to format the design of your entire slide show. This can be accomplished, by clicking on the “Theme” icon along the toolbar

Theme icon

Note: If you do not see the “Theme” icon, click on a blank spot on your slide. This will make the toolbar option appear.

After clicking on the “Theme” icon, a panel will appear on the right side of your screen with all the pre-loaded themes available.

Themes available

You can scroll through these themes. Clicking on one of these themes will apply the theme across every slide in your presentation.

Themes applied across entire presentation

75.0.3.6.1 Changing background color

In addition to pre-specified themes, you can also alter the background color of all your slides. To do so, you would right-click on a blank spot on your slide. On the menu that appears, you would select “Change background”

Change background

A menu will appear where you can select the color you want your slides to be from the drop-down menu and click “Done.” This will only change the background color of the slide on which you’re currently working.

Change background color window

75.0.3.7 Rearranging slides

Sometimes as you’re generating a slide show, you’ll realize you’d rather your slides be in a different order. This can be fixed easily by clicking on a slide in the left hand panel of your Google Slides window, and dragging and dropping your slide to the position in your slide show where you’d rather it be.

Rearrange slides

75.0.4 Presenting Your Slideshow

Once you have created all the slides you want in your slideshow, you can easily present them. On the right-hand corner of the window, click on Present and your slides will be in full-screen mode ready to be presented.

View your presentation

75.0.5 Accessing, downloading, and sharing your slides

All of the Google Slides you generate are saved automatically on your Google Slides account as well as to your Google Drive account. Like the other document editors you’ve learned about, Google Slides has an auto-save feature that means you don’t need to actively save your work.

You can also download your presentations from Google Slides in different formats, such as Microsoft Powerpoint or Adobe PDF files. To do this, you would click on “File” in the top menu and then select “Download as.” You can then choose the format you want among the various options.

Download your presentation

For sharing documents you can follow the procedure we learned in the lesson on Google Drive. You can also share directly from the Slides itself by clicking “File” in the top menu and then choosing “Share” and entering email addresses of the people you want to share with or getting a shareable link.

Sharing your presentation

75.0.6 More specifics on using Google Slides

Here, we have covered the basics of Google Slides. If you want to learn how to further customize your templates, how to add transitions and animations, and details on working with images, check out the additional resources links below search for tutorials on YouTube.com.

Google also has extensive information on getting started with Slides on their Google Workspace Learning Center, which can be found at the following web address: https://support.google.com/a/users/answer/9282488.

All illustrations CC-BY.
All other materials CC-BY unless noted otherwise.