Presentations

Get to a first draft fast, then make it yours. About 30 min, beginner level.

You'll be able to

• Turn a five-point outline into a first-draft deck with Gamma, Canva or Microsoft Copilot.
• Rewrite slide headlines so each one states a point instead of naming a topic.
• Replace generic images and filler with your own evidence, and check every claim the tool added.

Start from your outline, not a topic

If you type “a presentation on community gardens”, the tool has to invent the argument, the evidence and the order. You get a tidy deck that says what every other deck on the topic says.

Give it your thinking instead. A short outline does most of the work:

• The claim: the one sentence you want the audience to remember.
• Three to five points that support it, in the order you'd say them.
• The evidence for each point, even if it's just a note like “survey chart here”.
• The audience and the time: a ten-minute class talk is not a conference poster.

Then let the tool do what it's good at. Gamma builds a whole deck from an outline. Canva's Magic Design puts it into a design you can edit by hand. Copilot in PowerPoint works inside the file you already have, though features depend on your license. The layout is the fast part; the argument has to come from you.

Headlines that state the point

Most generated slides have topic headlines: “Background”, “Key benefits”, “Results”. A topic tells the audience what the slide is about. It doesn't tell them what to think.

A better headline is a short sentence that states the slide's point, such as “Plots near schools were used twice as often as plots near offices”. The body of the slide is then the evidence for that sentence.

Rewrite every headline yourself, even the ones that look fine. Two quick tests:

• Read only the headlines, in order. Do they tell your whole argument? If not, a point is missing or buried.
• Ask what the slide proves. If you can't say it in one sentence, the slide is doing too much or nothing at all.

AI tools also like vague, punchy phrases (“Unlocking growth”). Swap them for something specific enough that someone could disagree with it.

Replace filler with evidence

A generated deck fills space: stock photos, icons, AI images and bullet lists that sound right but say little. Go through slide by slide and replace filler with something that supports the headline, like your own chart, a photo you took, a short quote from a source you read, or a diagram.

Then check everything the tool wrote. Generators sometimes add numbers, dates or claims that weren't in your outline. Treat any fact you didn't supply as unverified: find a source for it or delete it. Diagram tools like Napkin are handy for showing a process, but they can suggest relationships your text never stated, so make sure the arrows mean what you mean.

If you keep an AI-generated image, say so on the slide or in your notes, and follow your course's rules on AI in assignments. Finally, cut any slide that doesn't earn its place. Fewer slides with real evidence beat many with decoration.

Make it readable, then make it yours

Before you present, check the basics a generator can get wrong:

• Contrast and size: text should be readable from the back of the room and not sit on a busy image.
• Color: don't rely on color alone to carry meaning in a chart.
• Alt text: describe meaningful images for anyone using a screen reader. AI can draft it; you check it.
• Export: if your course needs a PowerPoint or PDF, export early and check the layout survived.

Keep confidential material out of these tools, especially on a personal account.

The talk itself is still yours. AI can draft speaker notes, but rehearse out loud in your own words, or you'll sound like you're reading someone else's script. One useful trick: paste your headlines into an assistant and ask it to play a skeptical audience member with three hard questions. Answering those out loud is better preparation than polishing another slide.

From a generated draft to a deck that argues

A student's outline for a ten-minute talk: claim “The campus garden should expand to a second site”, with three points on demand, cost and student wellbeing, plus a note to use their own survey.

Generated draft (Gamma): eight slides titled “Introduction”, “The power of community gardens”, “Key benefits”, “Challenges”, “Conclusion”. Stock photos of vegetables. One slide says that gardens “reduce stress by 40%”, a figure that wasn't in the outline and has no source.

After editing:

• Headlines rewritten: “The garden's waitlist is longer than its plot count”, “A second site costs less than one semester of the current lease”, “Gardeners in our survey said it was their main break from screens”.
• The stock photos replaced with the student's own survey chart and a photo of the waitlist board.
• The 40% claim deleted after the student couldn't find a source for it.
• Two filler slides cut. Speaker notes rewritten in the student's own words.

The tool saved an hour of layout. The edits made it an argument.

Try it

Your five-point outline, the generated deck, and the edited deck with every headline rewritten to state its point, plus a note on any claim you removed or checked.