Word processing is software you use to write letters, e-books, flyers,  e-mail, reports, etc. Think about what you want to say.  We can find the answers to many of our problems as we listen to each other with respect and respond with truth. 

 WORD PROCESSING – PT. 1

THE COMPUTER’S ATTENTION.

HOW TO TALK WITH YOUR COMPUTER..

SCREEN THINGS.

MENU BAR STRUCTURES IN WORD 2000 & 2003.

 THE COMPUTER’S ATTENTION

Using computers is as easy as understanding what is on and what is off.  The machine assumes certain things, like bold print is off and text is aligned to the left is on.  Your job is to tell the computer what you are thinking and how you want your ideas to look.

Like all communication, you need to reach your target in a language they can understand.  The computer is no different.  And it only deals with one area of what you’re working on at a time, where you place its attention.

The computer’s attention is focused wherever you see a black or blue light.  This light is either a thin line that is blinking or a solid highlight surrounding various text, numbers, graphics or pictures.  Whatever is in this light is what is impacted.  Is Bold or Italic on or off?  Are the scissors on or off?

A single blinking black light (sometimes called the cursor) means that the computer’s attention is focused on that one space in the one line or cell.

When you see that blinking light, you can begin typing.  Make the type size large (or small) enough for you to comfortably see by adjusting the percentage number on your tool bar.  On the tool bar is a number that’s a percentage.  Click the down arrow next to that percentage and adjust the working type magnification to suit your style.

If you have an expanded highlight that is not blinking, that means that the computer’s attention is on the area in that highlight.  The key is simply to put the computer’s attention on what you want to effect, and tell the computer what to do with it, like bold, put it in a table, put it on a different page, etc. 

PLACE THE COMPUTER'S ATTENTION ON WHAT YOU WANT OT AFFECT, THEN CLICK ON THE BUTTON OR MENU BAR ITEMS THAT CREATES THE EFFECTS YOU WANT.

HOW TO TALK WITH YOUR COMPUTER

Think of a computer as a brain mirror.  It reflects the thoughts you share with it on the monitor, over the web, on paper or whatever.  The machine takes your thoughts through a logical process (software) and gives you an opportunity to stress what you feel is most important.  It then gives you a chance to communicate your ideas to as many people as possible. 

1.         Highlight what you want to affect or influence.

2.         Click the appropriate button or item on the menu bar.

3.         Make your selections in a dialogue box if asked and click on O.K.

4.         Remove the highlight by pressing one of the arrow keys.

It is important to the computer that you know where its attention is.  You can change where the computer’s attention with keystrokes like the arrow keys, page up and page down or by moving your mouse pointer to the area on the screen where you want it to be.  Click the left mouse button once.  The light will move to where the tip of the arrow is.  This enables you to begin typing at the location of the blinking light.

There are three ways to place the computer’s attention.

Blinking Black Light:  When your word processor opens you first come to a blank page.  You’ll see a white portion of the screen.  This represents the page you will be working on.  When you see it, you can begin typing.

Solid Black Highlight:  When you see a solid highlight around an area of text, pictures or numbers, you are in the ‘Highlight Zone.’  To activate this zone to cover all the material in your document, hold down the Ctrl (control) key and press the letter A.  The light will stop blinking and expand its focus to cover the whole document.  Everything within the highlight is in the computer’s attention.

To Highlight A Specific Area:  To affect more than one space at a time, use a Drag – And – Drop maneuver with your mouse.  Place the top of the mouse arrow at the beginning or end of what you want to affect.  Click and hold the mouse button down.  Drag the arrow over what you want to affect.  Release the mouse button. 

Another way to highlight a specific area is to put the blinking light at the beginning of what you want to highlight.  Hold down the shift key.  Using the arrow key, highlight what you want.  When you have what you want in the computer’s attention, release the shift key.  One continuous piece at a time please, yet that may change soon.

 Once you place what you want to affect in the computer’s attention, you can then cut, copy, paste, change the style, center, calculate, duplicate, organize, etc.

SCREEN THINGS

To learn this information in Windows 3.1 from their main information windows click on HELP, WINDOWS TUTORIAL and do both the mouse and the Windows tutorials.

Title Bar – the top bar on a window that lists the title of the program and the name of the document you are working on.

Minimize Button – a minus sign located at the top right hand corner of the screen.  Single click the minus/minimize button once and the entire window moves to the bottom of the screen.

Maximize – Box with a bold square box next to minimize. Pressing this button makes the window take up the whole screen.

Restore – Maximize button at maximum.  Brings the window back to its original size.

Dialogue Box – A box of questions and settings the computer uses to find out what you want to do.

Tool Bars – Tool Bars are short cut pictures (icons) to help you do things in your program faster.  Click on VIEW – TOOL BARS – STANDARD – FORMATTING – OK You can also choose other tool bars. 

Icons – Small pictures on the computer screen that serve as a short hand for tasks, i.e. the spell check icon in Word is a small button upon which is written ABC over a check mark. As you slowly move your mouse over each button, it will tell you what it does.  It’s play time from here. 

Scroll Bar – located on the right and bottom of the screen, they are a way to quickly move you through what you’re working on.  Click either the up, down, left or right arrows to travel.  Also, a gray box can be moved with your mouse for faster action by POINT – CLICK and DRAG.

Menu Bar – the second bar from the top.  It offers lists and sub lists of the various tasks that the program can perform and asks you a series of questions to accomplish your goal. (more on this later).

MENU BAR STRUCTURES IN WORD 2000 & 2003

Here’s were we get deep into the program.  You won’t drown, but it will be a deep immersion into the way Microsoft Word thinks.  Again, don’t try to remember everything in this first presentation. Most of  the things you will see on the menu bar will be available on toolbars that are easy to work with, once you understand what they do.  So let’s look at what this program called Microsoft Word, part of the Microsoft Office package (suite) of programs can do for your ideas.

File - File Management

Edit - Cut, Copy, Paste, Find, just like a traditional editor

View - how you see the screen - toolbars, zoom, ruler, toolbars, headers & footers

Insert -  pictures, files, clip art, sound, web links, date & time, page break

Format - how things look drop caps, background, paragraph, typeface, size

Tools - spelling, grammar, mail merge, word count,  auto correct,

Table - insert and edit, format (check auto format) , select, add columns and rows

Window - manage open documents or work on more than one at a time

Help - Get specific instructions on how to do something, print it out.

Tool Bars - VIEW - TOOL BARS and click on the ones you want

As you place your mouse over it, it will tell you what it’s for.

The first item on the menu bar is called FILE.  You can either click on the word FILE or hold down the Alt Key and hit the letter F.  Notice how each word on the menu bar has one letter underline.  When you hold down the Alt key and hit the corresponding menu bar item (notice one letter is underlined in each word) the drop down menu falls automatically.

Alt

F= File

E=Edit

V=View

I=Insert

O=Format

T=Tools

A=Table

W=Window

H=Help

Some of the items on the menu list have short cut keys.  For example. Highlighting what you want to effect, holding down the Ctrl key and hitting the letter “X” will delete or cut the material from the document.  The short cut keys, where applicable, are listed on the menus. Consider the bars and buttons as shortcuts for the computer asking you what it is you want to do.

File

 

Word 2000	Word 2003 Professional
New	New
Open	Open
Close	Close
Save	Save
Save As	Save As
Save as Web Page	Save As Web Page
Versions	File Search
Web Page Preview	Permission
Page Setup	Version
Print Preview	Web Page Preview
Print	Export To
Send To	Page Set Up
Properties	Print Preview
(list of the most recent documents)	Print
Exit	Read
	Send To
	Properties
	(list of  most recent documents)
	Exit

New, Open, Close, Save, Save As, Save as Web Page, and Versions are all about file management – what goes where and what are you looking at and telling the computer to remember by saving.

New – Create a new document/file / piece that you are working on /page or collection of pages. Or…how to get a blank page.

Open – Open an existing file (Ctrl O)

Close – Close what’s on the screen – the computer will ask you if you want to save it, which means remember the keystrokes on the computer for later use.

Save – Save to a disk  (Ctrl S)

Save As – Save as a specific type of file i.e. .doc (Microsoft Word), .rtf (word perfect).

Save as Web Page – Design your webpage in word and save it to publish directly onto the web

Versions – when you’re working on a large document and want to save it in stages.

Web Page Preview,

Page Set Up (margins and orientation), Print Preview, Print and Send To are about how to send, set up and view what you’re working on.

Web Page Preview – (see your work as a web page)

Page Setup – Set page orientation, portrait or landscape, margins

Print Preview – see how a document will print before hitting paper

Print – print to a printer or file (Ctrl P)

Send To – Send your document as an e-mail,  into PowerPoint (slide show program) or fax

Properties – File information concerning where it is (which drive and folder) how big it is, author, name, company and other properties (you can fill in some information)

(list of the most recent documents)

Exit – how to leave the program – may ask you to save before exiting if you have not done so since your last edit.

New features (titles) for 2003

File Search – search for a file on a disk – your computer or removable disk

Permission – a way to restrict editing and access

Export To – send the file to a compact web language or a Cascading Style Sheet for a webpage, XML (design language), HTML (webpage language – linked to tutorials).

Read – Easy to read format for material written. 

Edit

Here’s where you find your editing tools to insert, delete and move things around.

Undo – This is a great feature that lets you back out of trouble.  It undoes the last task you did and ‘makes it like it was’.  It can repeat the process many times back.

Repeat – repeats your last action forward. (Ctrl Y)

Cut – deletes text or objects  and puts it in the temporary memory. (Ctrl X).

Copy – leaves original material in place, but makes a copy, and puts it on the clipboard, the computer’s temporary memory. (Ctrl C).

Paste – places material from the temporary memory into the page. (Ctrl V).

Paste Special – use this when you have special instruction for what you are inserting, like put it in as HTML (web page language) or an Excel (finance and math program) object.

Paste as Hyperlink – Paste it so that if someone clicks on it, it takes them to a page on the web. 

Clear - like the delete key it clears formats.

Select All: -Put everything in the document into the computer’s attention. (Ctrl A)

Find, Replace, Go To and Links are quick navigation tools.

Find - Find a word or phrase in a document.

Replace -  Tell the computer where it finds a word, replace it with another word like replace “sadness” with “joy”.  i.e. The “sadness” flowed through their tears.  The “joy” flowed through their tears.

Go To  -Takes you to a specific page in the document

Links  - Connect you with pages and sites on the internet.

Objects are images, tables, etc.

Objects -Pictures, graphs, shapes, clip art, word art, etc.. with something like a border, how words wrap around it, etc.

Office 2003 Additions

Office Clip Board: -Temporary memory that you can cut and copy to and paste from. Sometimes called the scrap or trash as they say in the land of Mac.

Copy as HTML - makes a copy that you can paste into a web page, with its HTML instructions.

View

Looking at things on the screen

Normal, Web Layout, Print Layout and Outline are about the screen.

Normal – plain view without regard to page or web structure.

Web Layout – what the page would look like on the web

Print Layout – how the document would look in print

Outline – a cleaner view of your document to help make it easier to move around.

Toolbars are the shortcut buttons that you can turn on and off from this feature.  It gives you a list and check off which tools you want to work with. 

Toolbars – little icons that, when you put what you want to affect in the computer’s attention and click the icon, it performs the task.  For a list of toolbars click here and select the ones you want on and off.

Ruler – located on the top and left hand sides of your screen’s work area,  it tells you the distance where your light is.  You can also drag tabs into place using the ruler.

Document Map – structure of your document

Header and Footer, Footnotes and Comments are like in the real world, notations you can add to your document.

Header and Footer – what you want printed on the top – bottom of the page

Footnotes – like in print further explanations of material in a document

Comments – a way to insert additional ideas into text

To see more of your page without the editing material use Full Screen.  When you want to go back hit the Close Full Screen button.

Full Screen – gets rid of many of the tool bars so you can see more information on one screen.

Zoom – determines how close up you are to the material

Wood 2003

Reading Layout – easiest to read on screen format.  Can’t edit much but easy on the eyes for reading.

Task Pane – on the right hand of your screen, it’s a to do list.

Thumbnails – small versions of your pages, pictures, etc.

Markup – comments, tracked changes from one version to another.

Insert
Putting things into your document like special letters, page breaks,  pictures

Break – end of a page, table column or section of your document

Page Numbers – tell the computer what style of page numbers

Date and Time – inserts the current date and time in many formats

Auto Text – pre-written closings, openings, attn, initials, etc.

Field – used in operations like mail merge (mass mailings), fields represent areas in a document that has changing information i.e. Mr. Jones, Mr. Smith, Mr. Johnson (the changing field inserts in one letter each Jones, Smith, Johnson).

Symbol – letters numbers and signs not on the keyboard ♫Ë.

Comment – A side note.

Footnote – notes at the bottom of a page.

Caption – explanation box to explain a graphic/picture, table or object

Cross-reference – a way to cross reference an item into another document, i.e. a numbered item, heading, bookmark, footnote, endnote, equation, figure or table. 

Index and Tables – where you can create an index or table of contents, table of figures and table of authorities. 

Picture – a file of an image, clip art and other listed items like WordArt.

Text Box – text set off in a box.

File – insert an entire file into the one you are working with.

Object – Picture, graph, line, etc.

Bookmark – a place(s) in the document that you can create links to.

Hyperlink – a section of the text that when clicked, goes to a web page or another document on your computer or disk.  An easy way to make a hyperlink is to highlight what you want to link from (text, picture or object) click on the toolbar button that looks like a button with a two link chain in front of it.  Type in the address box where you want to link to and say O.K.  (on the left of that box are buttons for web, e-mail, etc.).  Ctrl K also brings up the dialogue box about hyperlinks. 

Word 2003 Professional

Reference – Index and Tables

Web Component – when the document is saved as a web page it is a way to add link bars into your document. 

Diagram – this feature allows you to create dramatic diagrams like organizational charts,  in your document based on data you supply.

Format

How text and pictures look like type style, centered, backgrounds, tabs

Font – The style that letters and numbers takes.  Changes text in highlight

Paragraph – like in traditional writing a paragraph is a collection of words ending with the  ¶  sign.  This is about centering, indenting, and effects the entire paragraph(s) in the computer’s attention.  To turn the editing marks on and off click the  ¶  sign on the toolbar.

Bullets and Numbering – setting bullet points and numbering paragraphs, great for lists.

Borders and Shading – putting borders or background shades around pictures, paragraphs or pages.

Columns – Organizational tool that presents data in order like the 2 columns above used to show the difference between Word 2000 and 2003

Tabs – moves the light over a few (usually 5 spaces, though you can set it where you want.

Drop Cap – First letter in a paragraph is big

Text Direction – changes the text direction in objects

Change Case – makes capitals lower case and lower case capitals.  Great for adding effects

Background – the image, color, sound or texture you want in the background of your document - web page.

Theme – Used mostly in web pages, it’s a look for all your web pages that helps unify the presentation.

Frames – Like with a picture frame – a way to set aside a section of a document for special objects, text whatever. 

AutoFormat – helps give your document a uniform look.

Style – a great way to organize your document.  The same type of headings, paragraphs, etc. get the same style when you name it.

Object – putting an object into your document

Auto Formats – Auto Format with a new name

Styles & Formatting – Style plus

Reveal Formatting  - shows you the font paragraph and section formatting features being used).  This is a 12-point size, Garamond font, with a body text style, aligned left with no indentation.  Sectional formatting, like inside of columns, is also noted. 

TOOLS

Spelling and Grammar- Spelling and grammar checker.  Spelling errors are underlined in red and grammar errors in green.  (TOOLS – OPTIONS is where you set your spell and grammar checker options)

Language – Allows you to set the language, use the thesaurus and set hyphenation

Word count – tells you how many words, letters and spaces in your document – real helpful when filling in on line forms with letter or word maximums (500 words or less).

Auto Summarize - Creates an automatic summary of the document.  Also, gives  you the number of sentences summarized. The best way to see it is to do it.

AutoCorrect – Automatically corrects spelling (if it can guess what you are trying to say), punctuation and grammar.

Look Up Reference – Searches for more definitions than in the standard program dictionary

Track Changes – for when you are editing a document and want to keep track

Merge Documents – Used to display difference in documents

Protect Documents – Security for folks editing your work

Online collaboration – A way to have folks in different places work on the same thing. Office 2003 has Net Meetings where folks from all over the world can work on a project together within one program to help with editing and new ideas.

Mail Merge – Tool to do mass mailings.  You create 3 documents.  One is the main letter with fields in it for the different names, products, whatever.  The second is the list of addresses and special notes.  The third is the merged document which combines the letters with the special information. 

Envelopes and Labels – prints envelopes, labels, business cards, CD covers, etc..

Letter Wizard – Styled and structured letters, memos, agendas and the like.  When you do FILE –NEW a window opens up for the new document.  You have many choices

Macro – Recording a series of keystrokes that play back with you push keys where the Macro is, i.e. Ctrl Z could produce the sentence “In anticipation of a long and mutually beneficial relationship, I am, Very truly yours”.  Every time you hit Ctrl Z that sentence would display.

Templates and Add-Ins – More pre formatted designs and features.

Customize – Add commands to a tool bar

Options   Set defaults for grammar, spelling, printing, etc.

Office 2003

Research – has a list of reference books and a translation feature

Speech – needs to be installed, then you can speak and the words will come up on the screen. 

Shared Work Space – invite others and work in a connected desk space where tasks can be assigned, notes and comments accepted.

Compare &  Merge Documents – best when used on earlier editions of a document you are working on to help note changes –improvements?

Letters and Mailings – Mail Merge of letters with addressees with specific special information inserted…used forms.

Table

Managing information placed in columns and rows

A table is like what you find in the front of your checkbook where there are columns and rows to put your information.  Think of longitude and latitude and you can get the idea of columns and rows.  A table is a series of columns and rows.

Draw Table – Gives you a pen so that you can draw you own table

Insert – Inserts a table into your document

Delete – Once you highlight an area or the entire table, it deletes it

Select – Puts a table or a section of a table into the computer’s attention.

Merge Cells

Split Cells

Split Table

Table AutoFormat – Designs for you tables

AutoFit – resizes columns and rows based on the amount of data to be fit in.

Heading Rows Repeat

Convert – Converts information from table to plane text or from text into a table using paragraph marks (¶}, commas, tabs or other separation tools

Sort – sorts using a number of variables

Formula – does the math for you

Show Gridlines

Table Properties – special features like backgrounds, alignment (left, right, centered), etc.

Window

Allows you to see many projects at the same time.

 

Word 2000	Word 2003 Professional
New Window	New Window
Arrange All	Arrange All
Split	Compare
(list of open windows in the program)	Split
	(list of open windows in the  program)

New Window –open another window for you to be in either in the same program or in a different program

Arrange All – allows you to have multiple open windows of open documents

Split – puts two documents ( or a copy of the same one if you tell it) in the same window, split in half

(list of open windows in the program)

Help

 

Word 2000	Word 2003 Professional
Microsoft Word Help	Microsoft Office Word Help
Hide the Office Assistant	Show the Office Assistant
What’s This?	Microsoft Office On Line
Office on the Web	Contact us
WordPerfect help	Word Perfect Help
Detect and Repair	Check For Updates
About Microsoft Word	Detect and Repair
	Activate Product
	Customer Feedback Options
	About Microsoft Office Word

Microsoft Word Help – This is the Wizard of Word.  You can search for answers either through the program’s help or go on line to Microsoft.com to find additional information.  Here, the trick is knowing what to ask for.  Follow the instructions like you would follow a recipe.

Show/Hide the Office Assistant – Cartoon character who has suggestions, answers for you

What’s This? – a quick way to get an answer to your question by clicking on What’s This, then moving the computer’s attention over what you want an understanding of.

Office on the Web – Additional help, updates, clip art, templates, everything a growing Word user can have.

WordPerfect help – Word Perfect was “the” word processor before Microsoft Word.  It’s a good program.  For those switching from one to the other, the WordPerfect help is a good translator.

Detect and Repair – Program maintenance – run it if you’re having problems with the program responding.

About Microsoft Word

Word 2003 Professional

Microsoft Office Word Help

Show the Office Assistant

Microsoft Office On Line

Contact us

Check For Updates

Activate Product – Going on line to activate (register and get permission to use something from the program’s site.)

Customer Feedback Options

About Microsoft Office Word

That was tiring, but worth it.  You’ll see.  During your review time take each function in bold type and put it in the help index for a deeper understanding on how to apply the feature.

Just about every function can also be handled by a combination of keystrokes or one of the buttons on the toolbar.  So let’s look at the toolbar.  Click on VIEW, TOOLBAR and notice the arrow pointing right.  Follow that arrow and you’ll see another drop down menu that shows all the available tool bars.  Turn them on an off by clicking next to them then close.  To move a toolbar to a more convenient place, just do a drag and drop to where you want to go.

We’ll work with toolbars next lesson, but for now notice how when the mouse moves over one of these toolbar buttons, the name of what it does appears. 

To make something bold  put it into the computer’s attention by highlighting it, click on the B button, and the text is bold. During your lab time, type each of the headings, like New, Format into the help menu and read all the variations on each effect. 

Go back over the lesson in your lab time and click the links and visit those sites. 

Click below for the Free Training Notes E-book
 HOW TO COMPUTE

H A P P Y  C O M P U T I N G

J. Nayer Hardin

Computer Health Mall

Computer Underground Railroad Enterprises

C.U.R.E. Publishing