Word Processing: Introduction
Northern Virginia Community College, Alexandria, CEWD
Dr. William M. Pegram, Thursdays, June 8, 15, and 22, 2006 - 6-8:30PM

Catalog Description:

Using Microsoft Word, this "hands-on" course will provide the beginning PC user the tools for carrying out most day-to-day word-processing tasks, such as paper size and margin setting, line spacing, paragraph and font formatting, and text editing and modification. Various printing options, including envelopes, the making of tables, and the basics of placing pictures and drawings in text will also be covered

Topics Covered - Day 1

• Show toolbar buttons on 1 row vs. 2 rows - click the toolbar options button (gray with arrow) - this also displays the buttons you don't see if there isn't enough room with the row specification you have made)
• The Word Window
• Insertion Point
• Menu - the most recently used options appear first - if you wait a moment or click the arrow at the bottom, a full menu appears; alternatively, double clicking the name of the menu right away makes the entire menu appear
• Entering text - font size in points (1/72 of an inch) - default font is Times Roman 12point
• As you type, if you see red lines, that indicates Word thinks you have made a spelling mistake, if you right click, it will suggest possible alternatives in bold. A green line indicates a possible grammatical mistake
• Word wrap (soft return) vs. hitting enter (hard return) to force to a new line
• Displaying formatting - using the Show/Hide toggle button - backwards Paragraph symbol - useful for determining how many spaces are between words and where there are hard returns you don't want
• Zoom - doesn't affect how the document is printed, only the magnification level on the screen
• Backspace (deletes to the left of the insertion point) vs. delete key (deletes to the right of the insertion point)
• Deleting text by selecting it, hitting backspace or just starting to type
• Checking Spelling & Grammar as You Type - Tools>Options>Spelling and Grammar - you can check or uncheck boxes to control how this works
• Saving a document - application window vs. document window, use meaningful names, can use spaces, you don't need to specify the extension (.doc). In this dialog box, there is an icon to create a new folder
• Formatting text - select the text and then apply formatting - alignment, font and font size, bold, italics, underline
• Edit>Undo (Ctrl Z) and Edit>Redo (Ctrl X) commands
• Selecting a line - click to the left of a line; selecting word by word - Ctrl+Shift and then use right arrows to add, left arrows to subtract words from the selection
• Inserting Clip Art - Insert>Picture>Clip Art and then enter keywords for search. Double click on one of the alternatives or click the arrow next to the alternative and select Insert.
• Resizing a graphic - Click anywhere on the graphic to select it -- you will see sizing handles appear on the sides and corners of the document if it is selected. You can then resize by dragging these handles or by selecting Format>Picture>Size where you can enter precise measurements. Uncheck the aspect ratio box if you want to change the aspect ratio (relationship of width to height) in the picture.
• Saving a document - File Save or File Save As. If the document hasn't been saved before, File Save functions the same as File Save As and allows one to specify a location and filename for the document. If the file has been saved before, then File>Save will overwrite what was there previously (will not keep the former version). If you want to keep the former versoin, save the new version with a different filename or put it in a different location.
• Printing a document - File>Print gives you some options whereas clicking the print icon on the toolbar prints the whole document immediately. To cancel a print job, double click the print icon on the taskbar that will only show up while the document is printing. This is a much faster way to cancel than selecting Start>Control Panel>Printers and Faxes>Select the printer>Highlight the document in the list and then choose Document>Cancel.
• File>Print>Options and File>Print>Properties - what you see in each will depend on your printer but these allow options just as printing only in black and while and in draft mode, to save both time and expense.
• Insert vs. overtype mode - The default mode is insert mode where typing text does not delete existing text; to switch to overtype mode where typing text deletes existing text, doubleclick the OVR in the middle of the status line at the bottom.
• Bullets and Lists

Topics Covered - Day 2

• Changing Margins - File, Page Setup
• Changing Line spacing - Line Spacing icon or Format>Paragraph>Indents and Spacing or right click in paragraph, Paragraph
• Use a Header to Number Pages, # of Pages, etc. - View, Header and Footer - Headers and footers don't display in normal view unless you deliberately view them, but they do display in Print Layout view
• Autocomplete tip - Press enter to accept
• Check Spelling and grammar as you type - If you right click on a word with a red underline, various spelling options are displayed and you can pick one. If you want to turn off the underlining, select Tools>Options>Spelling and Grammar>Hide spelling errors in document
• Word's Autocorrect feature - When you position cursor over text that Word automatically corrected, a small blue box appears below the text. Click on box and you get the following choices - Change back, Stop automatically correcting this change, or Control Auto Correct Options -- you can also bring this up by Tools>Auto Correct Options -- you can add things to this list (e.g. can use as a shortcut to add something longer). To turn off the auto correct feature, choose Tools>AutoCorrect as You type>Auto Correct and remove check from "Replace text as you type"
• Insert footnote (what you see depends on what view you are using) by Insert>Reference>Footnote. Footnotes - can view footnote in Normal view as a tooltip, moving footnotes (cut and paste the note number (reference mark)
• Tools>Word Count -- then you have option whether you want to include footnotes and endnotes in the calculation whereas File>Properties>Statistics doesn't include footnotes and endnotes in calculation. Alternatively you can use View>Toolbars>Word Count
• File>Properties - be aware of what's here when you electronically submit a Word file to another person
• Automatic Page Breaks vs. Hard Page Breaks (Insert>Break>Pagebreak or Ctrl Enter)
• Hanging indent - paragraph formatting - all lines of a paragraph are indented except the first (Format>Paragraph>Indents and Spacing>Special>Hanging
• In Word, subsequent paragraphs you type pick up formatting of previous paragraph
• Hyperlinks - If you type a URL (e.g. www.nvcc.edu), Word automatically turns it into a hyperlink. If the user cursors over the URL, a tooltip appears that indicates that a Ctrl click will launch the browser with that URL
• shortcuts to select text- triple click for a paragraph, double click for a word
• Edit>Copy (Ctrl C) and Edit>Paste (Ctrl V). The Ctrl V is useful to remember because it will work some places where there is no menu available to choose Edit>Paste.
• Paste Options Button - When you copy text, a paste options button may appear and if you click on it, it gives you the option of having the pasted material match the formatting of where you are pasting it.
• Search and Replace - Edit>Find and Edit>Replace. The searching goes forward from the insertion point. One can undo replaces.
• Synonyms - Right click on a word and choose Synonyms. If you select word, and then choose Tools>Language>Thesaurus, it will give various meanings for the word and then synonyms for each meaning, so this cam be much more useful than selecting synonyms right off.

Topics Covered - Day 3

• Resume wizard - File, New, Other Documents, Resume Wizard
• Setting tab stops - Format>Tabs -- then enter the position of the tab and the type of tab, and then click set. Another way to set tabs is to click the tab selector at the left end of the ruler to cycle through the various tab choices to select the type of tab and then click in the ruler to position the tab. By default, tabs are placed every 0.5" If you set a tab, it eliminates the default tabs to the left of it. Tthe tab stop only affects the portion of the document below where the tab stop is entered. We set left-aligned, right-aligned, center, and decimal tabs.
• Clipboard - If you do Edit>Copy twice, the Office Clipboard will appear on the right with the two items you have placed on the clipboard. You can then select which items you want to paste. The Office Clipboard can hold 24 items whereas te Windows clipboard only holds one, so doing edit>copy twice only retains the last one. .
• Tables - Table>Insert Table and select number of rows and columns, or Table>Draw Table and then draw rectangle from upper left to lower right and then draw in rows and columns. To delete the table, Table>Delete>Table. Table Move handle -- position the cursor anywhere in the table and the move handle will appear just outside the upper left hand corner of the table. If you don't want the table borders and rows and columns to print, then you can select Table>Table Properties>Table>Borders and Shading>none.
• Tools>Letters and Mailings>Envelopes and Labels>Envelopes
• Adding a border to a paragraph -- make sure that you have an extra paragraph mark below the paragraph you want to border, so that the border is not carried forth to subsequent paragraphs - Format, Borders and Shading
• Nonbreaking space - Ctrl Shift spacebar -- prevents two words from splitting at the end of a line if separated only by nonbreaking space
• Nonbreaking hyphen - Ctrl Shift hyphen - prevents words from breaking at the end of a line if separated by a dash
• Columns - Type text, select it, and then select Format, Columns
• Widow and orphans prevented in default setting - widow is last line of paragraph displays by itself at top of page; orphan is first line of paragraph displays by itself at bottom of page
• Keeping paragraph with next - With cursor in first paragraph, choose "keep with next" in Paragraph Formatting; e.g. to keep a heading with the subsequent paragraph, particularly if the "heading" is followed by a paragraph marker
• File>Save as Web Page - will create an htm or html file and often a folder and you will need to have both on the website for your page to appear

Revised: June 8, 2006, comments to William Pegram, wpegram@nvcc.edu