PowerPoint Design Guidelines

Guideline 1: Make it big. Use a minimum of 18 point font size. This allows people in the back of the room to read text on your slide. It also limits you to approximately seven of text (which helps you to meet the criteria for the next guideline).

Guideline 2: Less is More. Try not to clutter a slide with too much text, graphics, and/or color. As a general rule, research suggests no more than 4 colors per slide and a minimum spacing of 1/2 inch between items.

Guideline 3: Use text appropriately. Don’t use all capital letters. They are too hard to read. Instead, use upper and lower case. Also abstain from using decorative letters (unless for a specific purpose supporting your content).

Guideline 4: Don't put anything you are going to say out loud on a slide - the audience is likely to be bored.  In other words, text in your PowerPoint presentation should highlight what your message, not spell it out word for word. 

Guideline 5: Use pictures. As the saying goes, pictures can be worth a thousand words. Emphasize your ideas with the use of graphics.  Graphics are visually stimulating and more easily remembered.  Charts are an excellent way to present statistics and numbers.

Guideline 6: Don't use clip art for clip art's sake.  Tie the clip art into the idea you are presenting. Clip art and pictures should add to the idea being presented rather than distract from it.

Guideline 7: Watch your Color Combinations. Some background and foreground color combinations are difficult to read. For example, green writing on a yellow background or blue writing on a red background are difficult to make out. Standard color combinations are black on white background, white on a blue background, yellow on black background.  

Guideline 8: Think about staggering the appearance of text, graphics, and/or clip art onto a slide using Custom Animations.  When different components are introduced onto a slide at different times, it is more interesting.  Be careful not to overdo – it might make the audience dizzy – or confused! 

Guideline 9: Always ask yourself, “What is the purpose of this slideshow?”  Questions such as “Who is this presentation for?  How will they benefit from this slideshow?” will help you stay focused on the purpose of your project and not get side-tracked into all of the different options in PowerPoint.

Guideline 10:  If you can’t figure out how to do something in PowerPoint, don’t get discouraged! Keep trying. You are more apt to remember what you’ve discovered if you’ve learned it on your own. And don’t forget there’s more than one teacher in the lab. Your peers are a wealth of information.  Use Microsoft Help also. Look for the answers and you will find them!