Adding PowerPoints or Google Slides





Add a PowerPoint File

0:00
In this video we're going to talk about uploading PowerPoints and Google Slides to your Canvas course.

I'm going to click week 1 Plate Tectonics and here, under the Learning Resources, is where I want to see the PowerPoint files.


Find the place in the Module

0:15
I'm telling students to read. The teacher has the commentary on the reading. This might be video of the teacher giving a lecture or a short video introduction to the reading from the book. Plus the teachers indication of what are the key issues, such as "make sure to read pages 10 to 15", "pay special attention to certain topics", whatever takes the place of teaching in the online course.

0:40
But I want the PowerPoint right here. The way you do it, of course, is in this module you click the plus sign, and you click that you're going to add a file because it's a PowerPoint file.

It's a new file and I'll browse for it. Here it is. This is a PowerPoint file that has nothing to do with plate tectonics, but I'm using it anyway. And I'll add that PowerPoint file.

1:00
Of course it goes to the bottom and I'll drag it where I want it to be. I want the PowerPoint to be right after my commentary. I'll increase the indent.


Change the name in the Module

1:09
So what will the students see if the student clicks...  oh I don't want it to say "installation.pptx". I want to change that name. So I will edit it and I'll just give it a new name. I'll call it the PowerPoint because I think that looks better. Name it whatever you want.


Students can see and/or download

1:29
What will the students see? Well if the student clicks it, the student or teacher, Canvas will natively, just inside Canvas, display the PowerPoint file to the student.

If the student wants to, the student can download it. But here it is. The student can just view it inside of Canvas. It's very nice for the student and it's just fine for the teacher as long as the PowerPoints never need to change.


Problem with PowerPoint files

1:50
But what happens if you have to edit this? What happens if you or the students find typos and you need to edit this PowerPoint presentation? Well you'll have to download it, open it in PowerPoint, edit it, save it, re-upload it, and relink it into your course.


Use Google Slides to solve

2:09
That's a huge pain in the neck and probably you'd be much better served if this wasn't a PowerPoint but was converted to a Google slide.

Why? Because Google slides are a lot like PowerPoint except that Google Slides are webpages. It's a web page and you can edit that directly from within Canvas.


Using a Google Slide in Canvas

2:27
So what we have to do is go to the Google Slide. Let me switch over now to the browser that has the Google Slide on it. And Here I am in Lobo Apps.

You would click Drive and Drive would bring you to your Drive. I have a folder called @test where I'm going to be doing a test here of Google Drive.


Converting a PowerPoint to a Google Slide

2:52
I want to put my PowerPoint file up here on Google Drive and have it be converted to a Google Slide. The slow way is to drag your PowerPoint and drop it in and then right-click that PowerPoint and indicate to open in Google Slides. That's the slow way.


The fast way: Drive settings

3:07
The fast way is use the settings in Google Drive. Click settings and just check this button "convert uploaded files to Google Docs editor format". This way whenever I upload a Word doc or a PowerPoint or a Excel spreadsheet it'll automatically be converted to the Google format of those documents.

So I'm going to take this PowerPoint file and just drag it and drop it into here. And Google Slides will automatically convert it. It takes a few seconds but here I now have my You-Do-It-Installation slideshow.


Using Google Slides

3:49
This is the symbol for a Google Slide. This is a Google slide not a PowerPoint.

I'm going to open this by double clicking it. Here I am looking at the Google Slides version of this PowerPoint file. It's been converted.

It works just like PowerPoint. You can click through the various slides on the side and you can view and present the slideshow just like you would expect.

It does most of the things that people really need to do out of PowerPoint. It doesn't do everything.  


Verify the conversion

4:18
Once you convert you need to make sure that it works well, you need to look through and make sure it's ok. If it's okay you now want to use this inside of your course.


Using the Google Slide in Canvas

4:25
Remember this Google Slide is a web page. It's not a downloadable document that you have to upload into your course as a file. It's a web page that we need to share.


Share the Google Slide

4:38
Right now it's private only to me. I'm going to click "Share" and then I'm going to click "Advanced" and in Advanced I'm going to change this part right here.

Who has access? Right now, private, only you can access. But I'm going to change that so that anyone with the link can access it. And I'll click Save.

This then is the link. Now anyone who has the link can view. That's what I want.  Nobody can change it. My students won't be able to change it. But they'll be able to view it.


Put the link in Canvas

5:04
And I want to copy it. And now I go back to my Canvas course and I'm going to add a content page, a new page, and it's going to be the Google Slides for week 1. I'll add it.

Of course it goes to the bottom. I'll make it visible. I'll drag it up and I'll indent it so it's in the right spot.

Now I'll click it because I can edit it and I can make some introduction here if I want. I can type in whatever it is I want the students to be able to get out of this Google Slide.

And then here I put the Google Slideshow and select that and paste in that URL. Then I click Save.


What does it look like in Canvas?

6:10
Now let's go back to week 1, Home, ... back to week 1. Here now I have my Google slides. If the student clicks it ... they click the Google slideshow, and it presents them as a web page with the whole slideshow.

They can choose View and Present and watch this thing as a normal PowerPoint style, normal the slide show.

But the beautiful thing is for me, I can edit this thing because this is just a web page. So if you find a typo you can fix it right away.

Isn't that handy? When you're done you close it. And we're back to the home and back to Week 1.


Conclusion

7:00
So if it's a PowerPoint presentation that never changes, fine, upload it as a PowerPoint. It'll be just fine for you and the students.

But if it changes with some frequency, it's going to be a lot better for you if you convert it to a Google Slide. You'll be able to edit it right away without allthe laborious download and open and save, etc.... There you go.