Google Slides Essentials
Build and deliver presentations in Google Slides, and apply the same design discipline that governs any presentation tool.
By the end of this lesson you can
- Create a presentation using layouts and the theme system
- Collaborate on a deck and use speaker notes
- Present with Slides, including presenter view
- Move a deck between Slides and PowerPoint
Lesson Notes
Read through the key concepts before you try the challenge.
Same principles, browser-based
You build the staff in-service presentation at Lakeside Medical Associates.
Two colleagues are contributing slides and the deck must be presentable from whichever machine is free in the conference room. Emailing a .pptx between three people produces three partial decks and a scramble on the morning.
Your task: Build the deck where all three can work in it, and present it from any machine with a browser.
Everything in the PowerPoint modules about presentation design applies here without modification. The audience still cannot read and listen at once, text-heavy slides still fail, layouts still keep a deck consistent, and speaker notes still belong in the notes pane rather than on the slide.
What Slides changes is access. The deck lives in Drive, several people can build it simultaneously, and it presents from any browser — which removes the most common presentation failure, which is the file being on the wrong computer.
| PowerPoint | Google Slides | Note |
|---|---|---|
| Slide Master | Theme builder (Slide > Edit theme) | Same inheritance idea |
| Layout | Layout | Identical concept |
| Design tab themes | Theme panel | Applies colors and fonts deck-wide |
| Presenter View | Presenter view | Notes, timer, and audience Q&A |
| Save As .pptx | File > Download > Microsoft PowerPoint | For handing to someone using PowerPoint |
Three staff must build one deck over two weeks, and it will be presented from whichever conference room machine is free. What is the strongest reason to use Google Slides here?
Challenge
Apply what you've learned in this lesson.
Build a short deck collaboratively and check that it survives conversion.
- Create a six-slide Google Slides deck on a workplace topic. Use a title slide and at least three different layouts. Put your talking points in speaker notes, not on the slides.
- Share it with a classmate as Editor and have them add one slide using an existing layout. Confirm their slide matches the deck's design.
- Download the deck as .pptx and open it in PowerPoint. List every difference you find between the two versions.
- Present the deck in presenter view and note what you can see that the audience cannot. Write two sentences on why that matters for how you deliver it.
Finished this lesson?
Progress is saved in this browser only. It is not a grade — official progress lives in Brightspace.