Word For Windows

From Library Instruction Wiki

Word For Windows - Teacher's Guide

Prep: Having 3 1/2 inch disks with a document saved on them might be a good thing to have - having a longer document to work with might help when illustrating cut and paste and formatting stuff.

Handouts: "Anatomy of Word," "Toolbars," "Copy, Cut and Paste" (usually all three are stapled together)

WHAT IS WORD:

“Word” is a piece of software that is on your computer. Many computers come with Word on them when you buy them. More recent purchases of PC’s, especially those with Vista on them, may not have Word on them automatically – you will possibly have to pay extra to get Word and other programs to come with your computer.

Word is available on all library computers – the catalog computers and the Internet computers.

Word is a word processing program. That’s the computer equivalent of a typewriter. You can type up a resume or a letter or a story, or you can make a sign or a banner or a newsletter.

Minimizing and Maximizing:

Show where the Minimize, Maximize/Restore Down, and Close buttons are and what they do. Have people practice minimizing to the task bar, maximizing and restoring down. If it seems appropriate, explain how to resize a window (on the edge, when the arrow becomes a double arrow, click and hold, move out or in to make the frame bigger or smaller)

Also explain the close button, and have people close out and restart Word.

Toolbars and Menus:

For this section of the class, use the first two pages of the handout – anatomy of Word, and Toolbars. If you notice anything missing from the handouts, make a note of it, so we can keep them up-to-date and valuable.

Start with Menus – Talk about what kinds of things are in the menus, especially under File, Edit, and Format. Then explain that most of the common things that people want to do in Word will also be on the toolbar.

Toolbars – icons represent the most commonly used tasks in Word, including Save, Open, Copy, Paste, and formatting options.

Copy and Paste:

For this section use the third page of the handout, Cut and Paste. Talk about the value of hi-lighting, not just for copy and paste, but for doing all kinds of things in Word.

Have the people type a prepared phrase on the blank document. Something short, like:

“I love the library” “The quick brown fox jumped over the lazy dogs” “Have a nice day”

Or something. The longer the phrase, the more time it will take for some people to type. Some people will be embarrassed by their typing ability, and will be uncomfortable typing anything too long, especially if there’s a chance others might be watching. So, choose a short phrase, or give people the option of one or two phrases.

Once they have something typed, instruct them to press Enter several times to move down the page.

Now, have them hi-light the phrase they just wrote. Explain the different ways of hi-lighting, if you think it’ll be helpful – click and drag works great, but you can also click in the margin next to a whole line to highlight the whole line, etc. You can double-click on a word to hi-light just that word, or triple-click on a line to get all the words in that line.

Once highlighted, take them through the various means of Copy and Paste, and have them make several copies of their phrase.

After making several copies, you might show them the Undo button, to remove the last action done in Word, and get rid of one of the copies.

Repeat these steps if it looks like it would be helpful.

Save and Open:

Props: Computer disks, USB drive

Two or three options here. Show and tell with computer disks and USB drives. In VA computer lab, we’ll be able to save the documents on the hard drive, but in classes conducted elsewhere, that option might not be available. In that case, having people save on a disk or USB drive would be appropriate.

Explain what happens the first time you save a document vs. the next time you save it. Show how to save a document, and how to pick where you want it to be saved – on the hard drive or on a disk or USB drive.

Save the document someplace.

Before closing the program, have everyone type their name at the bottom or top, to make a change on the document, then instruct them to close the document (with the X) without saving. They will get the reminder message asking them if they want to save before they close. Have them save.

Now, open Word again, and use Open to look for the file. Explain that the process is very similar in reverse – you have to pick where you want the computer to look for the file.

Fun With Formatting:

Formatting can provide a lot of filler for the class, if you find it’s moving quickly. If it’s moving slowly, then stick with the basics:

Highlighting something means you can do stuff with it.

So conduct a variety of experiments with Text Size and Color, Centering, Bold, Italics, etc.

Page Setup

Here’s another extra that you can show if you have some time – switching from portrait to landscape layout.

Notes, Ideas, Conclusions, etc.:

At this point, the essentials are covered. Repeat any essentials as needed by the class. Encourage people to take the class again if they would like more practice and a refresher. Remind them that Word is available on all FVRL computers, including the catalog computers - so they can practice with it for as long as they'd like without worrying about the Internet computers time limit.

You could explain how many features shown in the class are not exclusive to Word. You can switch the page setup when you want to print something online that’s too wide for a normal page, for example. You can save web pages to your computer using the Save feature. You can copy and paste things from the internet into an email or a Word document. So these are skills that they can use in Word, and out there on the web.

If people ask questions like "What does this icon do?" or "What does this mean?" and it's a command or icon that you don't use or don't know what it's use is, just let the patron know that you don't know. Try and experiment with it, and see if you can figure it out with them. Sometimes people are satisfied by the thought that if their teacher doesn't know what something is for, then it's probably not something they'll have cause to use any time soon.