I love power point. It's a well rounded easy to use program that anyone can use if you have the patience to get through the myriad of options that are available to you.

If you do not have microsoft word, there are a number of other programs that are available to you free of charge that are able to be used in a similar manner. OpenOffice.Org is a powerful program that works very similar to Microsoft^(R) Office and there is also an online program that is available at Zoho.com that allows you almost as much flexiblity as Microsoft^(R) Office.

I will not walk through these programs in this hub unless you ask later that I do and I'll be happy to come back and add additional modules. Let's talk about Power Point!

The first thing you're going to want to do obviously is to launch Power Point. Using your 'start' button from Windows^(R) find the tab that says "Microsoft Office" and select "Power Point" from the list that appears when you run your mouse over this tab.

Now you'll see it's decision time (depending on which version of Power Point you are using)! You're going to get a pop up box that gives you the option to (a) use the auto content wizard (b) design template (c) blank presentation or (d) open an existing presentation. (see the exact box below)

For those who are brand new to using Power Point I might suggest you begin with the auto content wizard as you will learn much from this!

Now you'll see a menu that will allow you to get started making your very first presentation (auto content menu shown below - Image 1). The purpose of the auto content wizard is to help you organize your presentation as well as to provide you with information along the way to keep you on track!

If you click on 'next' you're going to see a series of buttons on your left that give you some options for your presentation (this menu is shown below - Image 2). Select your option and then click on the next button below (for purposes of this hub I'll use "general" "generic"). Note: there are too many to list which is why I abbreviated this menu.

Now that you've selected this option (if you're using what I used) you'll get yet another menu that will ask you what your output type is going to be (a) on screen presentation (b) web presentation (c) black and white overheads (d) color overheads or (e) 35mm slides. For the purposes of this instruction I am going to select web presentation (option b). (note you can see this menu in the pictures below - Image 3) Now click on the next button again.

The menu that you should see now is asking you to name your presentation (presentation title) and also offering you the option to add a footer to all of your slides (note: you can see this menu in the pictures below - Image 4). You will also see two checkboxes (which are checked by default) one that says Date last updated and slide number. If you do not wish to have both of these items listed on your slides, you should remove the checks from the box or boxes. When you have completed simply click on the next button again.

You will now see the auto content wizards response to you that you have completed all of the steps that are needed to begin your presentation. If you're satisfied you can now click the 'finish' button or if you want to change something you may do so by clicking the 'back' button. (note: you can see this menu in the pictures below - Image 5)

Now the final steps to this are really very easy. You'll see that Power Point brings this presentation into nine slides and has a filled in background and to the left you're going to see tips on how to fill in the slides with text. (see actual slide below)

Power Points Help Menu is very intuitive (see below).

Have fun!