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Microsoft Word
Microsoft Word is a software program used to create documents on the computer. Some of the more popular uses of Word include writing letters, creating posters, or printing address labels.

First Steps
Step 1: Open Microsoft Word
You can usually find the program as a shortcut on your desktop by looking for the blue icon (shown above) You can also find the program by following these steps: A. Click on the Start Button B. Click on All Programs C. Click on the folder Microsoft Office D. Click on Microsoft Word 2010 Once the program is open, you will notice that a blank document is already waiting for you to start typing. A straight-lined cursor will be blinking on the top left side of the blank page. This blinking cursor indicates where the text will appear when you start typing. Each time you press a character key on the keyboard, the character will appear on the page and the cursor will move to the right.

Typing Your Document

Step 2: Begin writing your document.

Dear Sir, The quick brown fox jumped over the lazy sleeping dog. Sincerely, [type your name here]
To move down a line after typing Dear Sir, press the ENTER button once. While you are typing the sentence, you do not have to press Enter when the cursor gets to the side of the page; the program will automatically move the next word to the line underneath. If you make a typing error, you can fix it by using the Backspace button or the Delete button. Both of these buttons can be found close to the Enter button on your keyboard. The BACKSPACE button will erase the letters to the left of the cursor. The DELETE button will erase the letters to the right of the cursor. Lets try using the Backspace and Delete buttons. With your mouse, move the pointer until it is in the word Fox between the o and the x. Click once. The blinking cursor is now in that spot. Click the Backspace button once. This will erase the o. Click it again to erase the f . Click the Delete button once. This will erase the x. Now type the word again, and move the blinking cursor to the end of your name.

The Toolbar and Titlebar

Beyond just letting you to type a document, Microsoft Word also has several functions that allows you to adjust how your document looks. These adjustment options are found in the TOOLBAR at the top of the window. We will be using the Toolbar in the next several exercises.

The Toolbar is separated into tabs. The two most important tabs are the first two on the left side: FILE and HOME. The Home tab is the tab that is open when you first start the Microsoft Word program and has the options that are used the most. The File tab is where you can find functions such as SAVE, PRINT, and CREATE A NEW DOCUMENT. Above the Toolbar is where you find the TITLEBAR. Besides having the title of the document, the name of the program, and the Minimize/Maximize/ Close buttons, the Titlebar has several functions that are helpful when you are creating a document. The more popular ones (SAVE, UNDO, REDO, SPELLING/GRAMMAR CHECK, and Quick PRINT) are pictured to the right.

The UNDO and REDO buttons are helpful if you make a mistake in formatting your document. Clicking UNDO once will undo the last change you made to your document, whether it was typing or formatting. Try clicking Undo several times to see what is undone. Now click REDO. The last thing that was undone will be redone.

Saving Your Document

Step 3: Save your document so you can work on it later.
It is very important to make sure you save your document while you are working on it. 1. Click on the blue FILE tab, located on the toolbar to the left of the Home tab. 2. Click on SAVE AS. This will bring up the list of files in your Documents folder. 3. Change the File Name to Practice Letter and click SAVE.

Your document is now saved. While you continue working on the document, it is good practice to save the document every 5 minutes. To do that, click on FILE, then SAVE. You can also find the SAVE ICON above the toolbar.

Retrieving Your Document

Step 4: Closing your document and retrieving it to continue working on it later.
Sometimes you may not be able to finish working on your document all in one sitting. Before you close your document, always make sure to save it first. In case you forget, the program will usually ask you if you wish to save it first. 1. Click the red CLOSE button at the top right of the title bar. 2. If prompted, click the Save button. The program will now save the document and close.

To retrieve your document:

1. In your FREQUENTLY USED PROGRAMS area on the Taskbar, click once on the LIBRARY FOLDER icon. 2. Double click (click two times quickly) on the DOCUMENTS folder. 3. Find the Practice Letter.docx document in the files list. Double click on the title. This will open the Microsoft Word program, and your document will be there ready for you to continue working on it.

Font Type and Size

Step 5: Change the font and font size of your document.
Now that you have typed your document, lets change the font size. 1. Move the mouse pointer until it is hovering before the D in Dear Sir. Click the mouse and HOLD the mouse button down. Drag the mouse pointer until it is at the end of your name. This will HIGHLIGHT the text. 2. Locate the FONT section in the Home tab. Click on the small arrow next to the font name. A list of optional font styles will appear. Find Times New Roman and click on it. Your text has now changed to that font. 3. Now lets change the FONT SIZE. There are two ways of doing this: A. In the Font section, locate the number next to the font name. Click on the arrow to bring up the size options. Click on the font size 36. B. Next to the font size are two letter As, one bigger, and one smaller. Clicking on the Bigger A will increase the font size, clicking the Smaller A will decrease the font size. Practice increasing and decreasing the font size, ending with the font size 26.

Font Style
Step 6: Change the font style of your text
Now lets change the style of the text. In the Font section underneath the Font Size are three buttons: B (BOLD), I (ITALIC), and U (UNDERLINE).

1. Highlight the word quick in your document. Make this word BOLD by clicking on B once. 2. Now highlight the word jumped. Make it ITALIC by clicking the I once. 3. Now highlight the word lazy, and UNDERLINE it by clicking the U once. Your document should now look like this:

Dear Sir, The quick brown fox jumped over the lazy sleeping dog. Sincerely, [your name]
Lets Save the document now. Click on the SAVE ICON in the Titlebar

Paragraph Styles
Step 7: Change the paragraph style of your document.
In the Home tab next to the Font section is the PARAGRAPH section. Here is where you will find the buttons to help change the way your document paragraphs look.

Lets change the line spacing of our document. 1. Highlight the whole document. 2. In the Paragraph section, find the LINE SPACING icon and click it. 3. Move the mouse over the different numbers listed. You will notice that the spacing between the lines gets wider as you go from 1.0 to 3.0. Click on 1.0 to close the window and make the spacing as thin as possible.

Now lets change the alignment of the text. 1. Find the ALIGNMENT BUTTONS in the Paragraph section. 2. Click on the second one. This will cause your text to be centered on the page. 3. Click on the third button. This will make your text line up on the right side of the page. 4. Click on the fourth button. This will stretch the spacing of the text so that it fits from the left margin to the right margin. 5. Now change it back to left alignment by clicking on the first button.

Copy and Paste

Step 8: Copy the letter into a new document.
Now lets practice copying and pasting. First, we are going to open a new document. 1. Click on the File tab. 2. Click New. Click on Blank Document and then on the far right side under the picture of the document, click Create. Your new document is now open. But we still need to copy the letter from the document we already saved. A. To go back to this document, find the Microsoft Word icon on the left side of your taskbar. It should have two white boxes, one on top of the other. B. Hover your mouse over the Word icon. Two smaller windows will appear, one showing the document with words typed on it, the other showing a blank page. C. Click on the small picture of the document with typing. This will bring up your already saved document. To copy the letter: 1. Move the mouse until it is to the left of Dear. 2. Click and hold the left mouse button. 3. Slowly drag the mouse across and down, highlighting the text. 4. Lift your finger off of the mouse. 5. In the Home tab, on the far left side, click on Copy. 6. Go back to the blank document using the same process as above. 7. In the Home tab on the far left side, click Paste.

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Printing
Step 9: Print your document.
1. Click the toolbar tab File. 2. Click PRINT. This will display the print options and a preview of what you will be printing. (Note: This occurs only in Microsoft Word 2010. In earlier versions, there is a separate option in the File tab that will say Print Preview. It is always good to look at the Print Preview before you actually print your document.) 3. Press the PRINT button to print the document as is. There are several options in the Print area that you can use to adjust how your document prints, such as printing double sided, changing the orientation of the paper, printing multiple copies, and printing specific pages instead of the entire document.

Congratulations! Youve successfully finished a Word document!!