Keeping it Real with Keynote

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This week, our Apple A Week series continues with an awesome post from guest writer, Brian Timm.  Brian is a Digital Learning Coach in Coppell ISD and is an Apple Distinguished Educator.  Let's learn from him as he highlights some Keynote tips and tricks.  

 New to Keynote?  Check out Apple's user guide for iPad and for Mac.
Keynote is Apple’s software for creating (potentially) beautiful presentations. I say potentially because you can take any presentation software and use it for evil deeds that’ll make you say, “What. The. Font”?  When building a keynote presentation, here are some quick wins, best practices, and creative uses that we have found helpful. 

Quick Win: Resizing Objects Efficiently


When resizing objects in Keynote for Mac, I used to drag from the corner, then have to move the object back to it’s original location. To keep the object in the same position and resize, simply hold down the “option” button, then click and drag.  
With the Option Button
Without the Option Button





Best Practice: Viewing the Object List

Text boxes, images, shapes, and media inside of Keynote are called objects. A best practice when building a Keynote on iPad or Mac with multiple objects is to show the object list. To do this, simply click on the “View” button and “Show Object List”. This allows you to easily rearrange objects, group objects, and do the next trick below!

Arrange layers from the Object List


Show Object List from the View Menu










Best Practice:  Using Opacity

Use shapes and gradient fill with different opacity levels to make text on your slide pop! With the “Object List” still in view, insert a rectangular shape. Drag and expand your rectangle to fit the slide width. With your rectangle selected, click on “Format” sidebar and “Style” tab in the top-right. Choose a gradient fill, and choose black for both the top and bottom. Select the color wheel for the side you’d like to fade to, and set the “Opacity” to 0%. Adjust your rectangle height as you see fit.   


  
Can you tell which uses shading and which doesn't?


Best Practice:  Create Magic Move Animations 


Become a Magic Move wizard! Magic Move basically creates an animation of objects moving from one position and/or size on a slide to a new position and/or size on the next when presenting. Learn or brush up on the basics of Magic Move with Apple’s Support Page. You may then discover more creative uses for Keynote. 

You could use it to help tell a story of different events using a timeline or, for example, a progression of iOS versions as shown below. Use Magic Move to create whole group games, quizzes, or choose your own adventure stories by linking your objects to different slides.   


  



What ideas do you have for using Keynote and Magic Move in the Classroom?  We are curating a list of ideas on Flipgrid right now - we'd love to hear your ideas!

Share your ideas for using Keynote in the Classroom here!


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Check out other posts from this series here.

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