Presentations with a large number of slides may be a challenge for managing unless they are logically divided into
Sections. Even presentations that do not have a
large number of slides can benefit from Sections. However, just dividing slides into Sections will not achieve much unless you create and name these
Sections in a proper manner to represent what the slides within each Section contain. In this tutorial, let us learn how to add Sections, and also how
to rename them.
Adding/Creating Sections
Follow these steps to add a new section to your presentation in PowerPoint 2011:
- Open your presentation and navigate to the slide within the
Slides Pane, this typically is the slide that will be the
first within the new Section you are going to create. As shown in Figure 1, below we selected slide 18, but your slide number may
differ.
Figure 1: Slide selected within the Slides pane-
Note: The Section option only works within PPTX file saved in PowerPoint 2008 and later versions.
- Now, create a new Section using any of these three ways:
-
i. Click on the selected slide and select the Home tab of the
Ribbon (shown highlighted in red within
Figure 2). Then click the Section button (shown highlighted in blue within
Figure 2). This opens a drop-down menu, within this drop-down menu, select the Add Section option, as shown in
Figure 2.
Figure 2: Add Section option within the Section drop-down menu- ii. Right-click (or Ctrl+click) the selected slide, from the contextual menu, select the
Add Section option, as shown in Figure 3.
Figure 3: Add Section option within the right-click contextual menu- iii. Right-click (or Ctrl+click) within the empty space above the slide where you want to
insert a section, and from the contextual menu, select the Add Section option as shown in Figure 4
(we right-clicked between slides 17 and 18).
-
Figure 4: Right-click contextual menu
- All of the three ways explained above add a new Section with the default name 'Untitled Section', as shown highlighted in
red within Figure 5. Additionally, this step also opens the Rename Section window, as
shown highlighted in blue within Figure 5.
Figure 5: New section added- Clicking the Cancel button within the Rename Section window will close this window, leaving the newly
created section with the uninspiring name 'Untitled Section'. However, the reason why we divide our presentation slides into Sections is to make them
easily manageable, and renaming your Sections can make this objective more achievable. So, within the Rename Section window overwrite
the default name with the name of your choice and click the Rename button, as shown in Figure 6.
Figure 6: New name typed within the Rename Section dialog box- This renames the newly added section, as shown highlighted in red within Figure 7.
Figure 7: Section renamed- At this point:
- i. Note that as of now all slides from 18 onwards are part of this new Section.
- ii. The remaining slides, i.e. slides 1 to 17 which were not sectioned so far will also be included in a new Section that may be called
'Default section' (as shown highlighted in red within Figure 8, below).
Figure 8: Another section was also created-
Note: You may wonder why two Sections were created when you expressly created only one? That's because PowerPoint insists on placing
all slides within any presentation within Sections, you can thus have all slides in a presentation placed within Sections, or no Sections at all.
There's no option to place just a few slides within a Section, and leave the remaining slides not within any Section.
- At this point of time, you will be left with two Sections, one with a proper name pertaining to the slides contained within, and another
that has an uninspiring name 'Default Section'! You must rename it, as per the process explained next.
Renaming Sections
PowerPoint 2011 provides you with an option to give a suitable name to your section at the time when you create a new section. But at the same time
if there are un-sectioned slides in the presentation, it may also create another section with the name 'Default Section', as shown highlighted in
red within Figure 8, above. This section should be given a proper name to represent the slides contained
within. Other than this, there may be a scenario where you need to change the name of an existing Section. Whatever may be your reason to change the
Section name, follow these steps to rename a Section:
- Click the heading of the section that you want to rename and follow any of the three ways explained below:
- A. Select the Home tab of the
Ribbon
(highlighted in red within Figure 9) and click the Section button, shown highlighted in
blue within Figure 9. This opens a drop-down menu, within this drop-down menu, select the
Rename Section option as shown in Figure 9.
Figure 9: Rename Section option within the Section drop-down menu- B. Right-click (or Ctrl+click) the selected Section heading, from the contextual menu, select the
Rename Section option, as shown selected in Figure 10.
Figure 10: Rename Section option within the right-click contextual menu- C. Double-click the selected Section heading.
- All of the above mentioned ways bring up the Rename Section dialog box, as shown highlighted in
red within Figure 11.
Figure 11: Rename Section dialog box- Within the Rename Section dialog box, type the suitable name for the selected section as shown highlighted in
red within Figure 12 and click the Rename button (highlighted in
blue within Figure 12).
Figure 12: New section name typed in- This renames the selected section, as shown in Figure 13.
Figure 13: Section name changed- Save your presentation often.
