Microsoft Office Tips & TricksTo Get Things Done Faster

Minimum Day Seminar Friday January 31, 2014

Mrs. Ventrella

Why?

As recently as April 2013, analyst and consulting firm Gartner estimated that Microsoft Office, the software suite in which Word comes packaged, still claims 80 to 96% of worldwide user share. And in a review of Word 2013, PCMag.com wrote, “After web browsers, Word is the most-used app on the planet…”

The following tips will work for all 3 Programs (and make your life much

easier) 1. Right mouse click is your friend.Choose your selection and then right mouse click (control click for Mac) to see lots of cool tools pop up.

2. Drag and drop selections. Choose your selection, then click on it and drag it to where you want it. This is especially helpful for tables.  3. Format PainterChoose something that is formatted the way you want it, click format painter, then choose what you want to have the same format and it will match the first selection. Double click Format Painter to choose multiple cells or phrases.

4. Control EditingControl+C = copy, Control+V = paste, Control+X = cut Control + Z = undoFor Mac, it is command, not control. 5. Save commonly used documents as templatesHave a teacher that always wants the same formattingor title page? Save a mock paper or presentation as a template.

6. Use a template from Office.com or the ElementsGallery. Need a professionallooking presentation or flyer?Just customize a template.

Microsoft Excel

Shortcuts.

Use the Ctrl Key and arrows for Quick Navigation

Select all your data by clicking the arrow to the left of A Column.

Quickly see the sum, average, min, max, or count by selecting the cells and looking at the status bar at the foot of the window.

Organization.

Use the Fill Handle to auto-fill things like numbers or days of the week

Hide a column by right clicking on the blue area of the letter at the top, then choosing Hide.

If you have a lot of data, filtering is helpful. Click anywhere in the column you want to filter, choose filter from the data tab. Click the down arrow next to the column.

Sorting can also organize your data. Click Sort and Filter from the Home tab. Choose Custom Sort. Then choose the column and values to sort.

Formatting.•Freeze the top row in order to view the column headings without scrolling. Click somewhere in your data, then choose Freeze Panes Freeze Top Row from the View tab.•Auto adjust the width of a column to the contents by clicking the column header and double-clicking the plus sign in the bottom right. •Add multiple lines of text by clicking ALT+Enter.

Functions.

=CONCATENATE(C1,B1) Merges two cells to form one word in a new cell.

Automatically sum a column by going to the first empty cell and entering Alt+=.

Repeat a function to every cell below in that column by double-clicking the box in the bottom right of the first cell.

Microsoft WordSelection.

Double-clicking anywhere on a word selects the entire word.

Triple-clicking anywhere within a paragraph selects the entire paragraph.

Pressing the CTRL key (Command for Mac) and clicking anywhere within a sentence selects the whole sentence.

Holding down the ALT key then dragging your mouse over any rectangular area allows formatting to be applied across that entire selection.  

Shift + alt moves paragraphs around in a paper. Just use the arrows.

Formatting.•Hit CTRL+E = center align, CTRL+L= left align, or CTRL+R = right-align•Generate placeholder text: type =rand(#of paragraphs, #of sentences)•Create a line across the page by typing --- and then Enter•Ctrl + = subscript, Ctrl Shift + = superscript.•You can remove formatting by selecting a section of text, and pressing Ctrl+Space. If the formatting has been applied with a style, press Ctrl+Shift+N and it will then revert to the default style. 

Misc•When editing, you can add a comment box. Just highlight the text and Insert Comment.

Microsoft PowerPoint

Animation Painter works just like the format painter, but copies animation.

Create a slide from a bullet on another slide. Choose Outline view, then select the bullet and click Shift + Tab.

Crop a picture to a shape. Select the picture, click Crop and choose Crop to Shape from the Format tab.

Reuse slides from another presentation. Click the down arrow next to New Slide, choose Reuse Slides and choose the file you want to use the slides from.

Add custom path animations to stand out.

Add audio, video, and pictures to your presentations.