Sections are a useful way to organize your PowerPoint slides into logical groups. Adding sections to your presentation can make it easier to navigate, collaborate with others, and focus on specific parts during editing or presenting. This article will provide a step-by-step guide on how to create and manage sections in PowerPoint.
Why Use Sections?
Here are some of the key benefits of using sections in PowerPoint:
- Enhanced organization – Divide your slides into introduction, body, conclusion etc. This clear structure makes your presentation easy to follow.
- Simplified navigation – Quickly collapse and expand sections to focus only on relevant slides. Helpful for long presentations.
- Efficient collaboration – Assign section-wise tasks to co-workers. Review each other’s work by section.
- Flexible editing – Easily make bulk changes to slides within a section in terms of layouts, backgrounds etc.
- Seamless presenting – Use section headers as visual cues to transition smoothly between topics.
How to Add Sections
Adding sections to group your PowerPoint slides is simple. Follow these steps:
1. Enter Slide Sorter View
The Slide Sorter view displays all your slides in a grid layout. To access it, go to the View tab and click Slide Sorter. This view makes it easier to manage sections.
Slide sorter view in PowerPoint
2. Right-click on the Section Starting Slide
In Slide Sorter view, right-click on the slide where you want the new section to start.
3. Select “Add Section”
In the pop-up menu, choose Add Section. This inserts a section break above the selected slide.
Add section in PowerPoint
4. Rename the Section
By default, new sections are labeled “Untitled Section”. To rename, right-click the section header and choose Rename Section.
Rename section in PowerPoint
Give your section a descriptive name summarizing its content e.g. Introduction, Market Analysis etc.
Repeat steps 2-4 to create multiple sections in your PowerPoint presentation.
Managing Sections
Here are some tips for efficiently organizing and managing sections:
Collapsing Sections
Click the arrow next to a section name to collapse it. This temporarily hides its slides, allowing you to focus on other sections.
Changing Section Order
In Slide Sorter view, drag-and-drop section headers to rearrange them. The slides within sections will move accordingly.
Removing Sections
Right-click a section header and choose Remove Section. This deletes the section break, merging its slides into the previous section.
Sectioning Best Practices
Follow these PowerPoint section guidelines for optimal results:
- Start sections from the end, so existing slides get grouped.
- Use 3-4 sections at most for easy navigation.
- Give descriptive names to sections.
- Put key slides like agenda, titles in separate sections.
- Use colors to color-code related sections.
Conclusion
Adding sections to your PowerPoint slides can greatly improve organization and presentation flow. By following the simple steps outlined, you can effectively group slides to meet your objectives – whether it’s simplifying collaboration or enhancing structure.
Use sections judiciously as excessive sections can make your slide deck confusing. Apply best practices around naming, ordering and limiting numbers of sections.
With this knowledge, you are now ready to organize your next PowerPoint presentation into organized, navigable sections for better results.
