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Inserting and Running Poll Everywhere in PowerPoint (or Keynote) on Mac

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When presenting with PowerPoint (or Keynote), instructors may want to utilize polls to gauge participant understanding or receive feedback as part of the presentation. It is possible to embed and run Poll Everywhere polls into a PowerPoint (or Keynote) presentation so that they can be initiated and managed from PowerPoint while presenting.

If you are running Poll Everywhere in PowerPoint and sharing your content via Zoom, you will need to share your entire desktop and not just the PowerPoint application. Zoom sees the live slide as a separate program and will not display it to your Zoom participants if you share only the PowerPoint application.

Logging into the Poll Everywhere Desktop Application

If you have not already done so, you will need to install Poll Everywhere's Desktop application, which is will align with the specific application and Operating System (OS), in this case PowerPoint and Mac, that you will be working in. Follow our support article on Installing the Poll Everywhere Desktop Application for more information.

  1. Open the Poll Everywhere Desktop application on your Mac computer and input your Yale email, press "Next" and confirm you want to be logged in through Yale.
  1. A new tab will open in your web browser confirming that your Poll Everywhere account is trying to log in with an external application (the Poll Everywhere Desktop app). Click "Confirm" to finish logging into the Poll Everywhere Desktop app.
  1. Once confirmed, your account will be logged into the Poll Everywhere Desktop application where you will see any poll activities you have already made.
    1. You will now be able to start inserting and manipulating Poll Everywhere activities in PowerPoints (or Keynote) presentations.

Inserting a Poll Everywhere Activity

  1. With the Poll Everywhere Desktop app open and logged in already, open a pre-existing or new PowerPoint (or Keynote) presentation and navigate to the specific slide where you want to add a new slide with the poll activity embedded to be placed after it.
  2. In the Poll Everywhere Desktop app find the specific activity polls that you want to insert from the list and use the check boxes to select them.
    1. Once selected, you can also moveduplicateclear, or delete the activity.
    2. In this window is also the option to create a "New activity."
  3. Once selected, click the "Insert slides" button to add the poll activity / activities as standalone slides in the presentation behind the slide that you had currently selected.
  1. Before the activity is inserted, Poll Everywhere asks if it should be inserted as one slide or a series of slides depending on how you would like your presentation to flow. Select one of the flow options and click the "Insert slides" button in the top-right corner.
    1. Default - inserts the poll as one slide within your presentation
    2. Engagement - inserts the poll as a series of slides that will move through this sequence, in order:
      1. Display the poll activity instructions
      2. Display the poll activity results
      3. Lock the poll activity slide as you continue to move through the presentation
  1. The poll activity will now be inserted within your presentation as a new slide. Repeat this process for each poll activity you want to add.

Running Your Presentation

If you are running Poll Everywhere in PowerPoint and sharing your content via Zoom, you will need to share your entire desktop and not just the PowerPoint application.

Zoom sees the live slide as a separate program and will not display it to your Zoom participants if you share only the PowerPoint application.

  1. Once a Poll Everywhere poll activity has been added to a PowerPoint presentation, you are free to run your presentation to activate the poll.
    1. When you get to a slide that contains a Poll Everywhere poll, the poll will activate and you will see the live slide displayed.
    2. The on screen poll options will appear if you move your cursor to the bottom of the screen.

You must have the Poll Everywhere Desktop application open and be logged into it while you present your PowerPoint (or Keynote) presentation for the poll activities to run properly.

For additional questions, please contact [email protected].

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