IC3 BASICS, Internet and Computing Core Certification

Key Applications

Lesson 10Creating and Formatting an Excel Worksheet

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Objectives Identify the parts of the Excel screen. Create and navigate through a worksheet. Use the AutoCorrect and AutoComplete

features in Excel. Change column width and row height. Format the contents of a cell. Merge cells. Use the Undo and Redo features. AutoFormat the worksheet.

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Identify the Parts of the Excel Screen When you launch Excel, a blank worksheet will

appear. It is given the default name Book1 until you save it

under another name. The Excel window is similar to other Office

applications. It has a title bar, menu bar, toolbars, and scroll bars.

The New Document task pane is displayed on the right side of the window.

The worksheet area is divided into rows and columns. Rows are horizontal and columns are vertical. The intersection of a row and column is a cell.

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The Excel Interface Window

Active Cell

Column identifiers

Worksheet area

Row identifiers

Formula bar

New Document task pane

Worksheet tabs

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Create and Navigate a Worksheet To create a worksheet, enter data into the

cells. You must first select a cell before you can

enter data.• Click in a cell to select it, and a dark border will

appear around the cell.• Once you have selected a cell, just type the data for

that cell. You can also enter data into the Formula bar.

Press the Tab key to go to the next cell to the right of the active cell.

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Active Cells and the Formula Bar

The figure on the lower left shows how the active cell will appear when it is selected. Once selected, you can enter data into the cell. If you move away from the cell and select it again, anything you type will replace the existing contents. You can change current cell content by selecting the cell, posi-tioning the insertion point in the Formula bar, and editing the existing text, as shown at lower right.

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Use Help to Navigate a Worksheet

There are many ways to navigate between cells in an Excel worksheet. To find more information, click the Help menu and select Show Office Assistant if it is not already displayed.

Enter “shortcut keys” in the search text box and click Search. A pane similar to the one at the right will appear with topics you can browse.

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Use the AutoCorrect and AutoComplete Features AutoCorrect is a feature that will automatically

correct commonly misspelled words as you type. For example, if you type “teh”, it will change to

“the” as you type. AutoComplete anticipates what you are typing

and displays a suggested word. It compares the first few characters you type with

words in adjacent cells to see whether you are entering a series of similar words or data.

Press Enter to accept the proposed word or keep typing to ignore it.

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Change Column Width and Row Height

If you enter data that is too wide for a cell, Excel might Display the data as a series of # signs. Cut off the data so only part of it is visible. Allow the data to run outside the column.

You can widen the column by Dragging the column border sideways. Using the Column Width command.

You can change row height in a similar fashion.

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Adjust Column WidthIn this figure, the data for cell B8 has extended into cell C8. You can drag the border for column B to the right to make the entire column wider than it currently is.

Position the pointer on the line between the columns until it becomes the two- headed arrow shown here.

Click the mouse button and drag. As you drag, a dotted line shows where the new column boundary will be if you release the mouse button.

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Format the Contents of a Cell Formatting the contents of a cell changes

the way the data appears. You may want to change data alignment. You may want to add commas to large

numbers. Some features that are easy to do include

Change font, font attributes, and alignment. Format numbers and dates. Use Format Painter to format multiple cells.

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Change Font, Font Size, and Alignment of Text To modify text, select the cell or a group

of cells. A selected group of cells is called a cell range.

Once selected, use the Formatting toolbar to Change the typeface of existing text by

selecting a new font. Apply bold, italic, or underline attributes to

selected cells. Change text alignment using the alignment

buttons.• By default, text is left aligned and numbers are right

aligned.

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Format Numbers and Dates You can use the Format Cells dialog box

to format numeric and data fields. There are several predefined categories

you can choose from. The options you can set vary for each

category. Once you’ve formatted selected cells, you

can copy the same format to other cells using the Format Painter. To do so: Select a cell that has the format to be used. Click the Format Painter button. Highlight all cells to be formatted the same as

the selected cell.

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Format Cells Dialog Box

Select the cell or cells to be formatted. Click the Format menu and choose the Cells option to open this dialog box. Note the categories available on the Number tab.

Note also that a sample of the current type displays on the right. Select a category and you will see various options for that format appear on the right side as well.

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Set Currency FormatIn this figure, the Currency type has been selected. Note the new options available on the right side of the box. You can specify how many decimal places you want, whether to display or not display a dollar sign, and several display options for nega-tive numbers.

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Merge Cells You can join two or more adjacent

cells together to create larger cells. This could be done for headers or for

long text fields. To do so:

Select the cells to be merged. Click the Merge and Center button on

the Standard toolbar.

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Use the Undo and Redo Features When editing a worksheet, you may change

something you did not mean to change. You can use the Undo command to reverse one

or more actions. Click the list arrow on the Undo command box on the

Standard Toolbar to see a list of actions. If you click on an action, that action and all actions

above it will be undone. The Redo command can be used to reverse the

result of an Undo command. This command also has an action list that allows you to

select the commands to redo.

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AutoFormat the Worksheet Excel provides several predefined

worksheet formats that can be used to give your worksheet a professional look.

AutoFormats include font styles, colors, borders, shading, and other features.

To apply an AutoFormat: Select the cells to be formatted Click the Format menu and choose

AutoFormat. Scroll through the thumbnails and select one

you like. Click the OK button to apply it to your

worksheet.

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The AutoFormat Dialog BoxThis box shows samples of formats you can apply to a worksheet just by selecting one and clicking OK.

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Summary The Excel screen has its own unique screen

parts,menus, and toolbars. To enter data in a cell, the cell must be selected

using the mouse or keyboard to move from cell to cell.

As you enter data, Excel will automati-cally correct some of your keyboarding errors. If the data matches characters of existing entries, Excel will propose the existing entry to save you time.

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Summary (continued) To change column width, drag a column border,

use the AutoFit feature, or specify an exact measurement.

When you format the contents of a cell, you change the appearance of the text or numbers in the cell.

If you want text to span across several rows or columns, you can merge the cells into a single cell.

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Summary (continued) The Undo command reverses a previous action.

The Redo command reverses an undo action. You can quickly and easily give a work-sheet a

professional look by applying one of the available AutoFormats.