1. Select the TEXT INSERTION tool in the DRAWING TOOL BAR, usually located along the bottom of your slide window. Click anywhere on the slide, usually on a side, and begin typing in the text box that will appear.
2. Use the FORMATTING PALLET or the pull down menus at the top or your screen to customize the text with fonts, size, and color.
3. The text block can be moved around the screen by clicking, holding and dragging on the grey border that surrounds the text. This box is visible after you have clicked on the text. When you have moved the pointer over the border it will change to an open hand, this indicates that it is now an object and that you can move it.
4. Or to delete a text box, select it with the pointer and then click on the gray border surrounding the type to turn it into an object. Hitting the DELETE key on your keyboard will delete the text.
TIP: If you have a lot of labels to add, just make up one, format it with the correct typeface, style and color and then for the rest, copy, paste and change the text as you go along. This method will go a lot faster than starting from scratch for each one.
TIP: You can also fill the type box with a color to make a colored box. Select the outer frame of the type box turning it into an object and then fill with a color using the FILL BUCKET. If you then select the type with the TEXT INSERTION tool you can color the text, lets say your chose white, you would now have a colored box with the type reversed out, a very useful technique for making labels.
This guide works with PowerPoint version 2003 and older. All of the principals will work with version 2007 but the locations of the tools will differ. Most of the tools have been moved up to the top of the screen into the Ribbon.
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