Introduction To Excel
SeniorNet Introduction to Excel is a tutorial, including practice files, designed to teach adults age 50 and older the fundamentals of Microsoft Excel. Microsoft Excel is a program for organizing, formatting, and calculating numeric data and text information. Excel displays data in a row-and-column format, similar to an accounting columnar spreadsheet. Consequently, Excel is well suited for working with numeric data for accounting, scientific research, statistical recording, and any other situation that can benefit from organizing data in a table-like format. Teachers often record student grade information in Excel, and managers often store lists of data—such as inventory records or personnel records—in Excel. On a more personal level, many people use Excel to prepare budgets and track expenses for their household, to track investments, and to maintain lists such as addresses, event invitations, and home inventory.
As you work through this course, you’ll learn how Excel makes it easy to perform calculations on numeric data and provides dozens of ways to format data for presentation purposes, including charts and reports. You will use hands-on instruction to learn how to enter, sort, and organize your data, automate calculations, format reports for printing, create graphs of your data, and query your data for summaries and information. The examples used in the hands-on instruction will include tracking your home expenses, managing your investments, and making a address book.
To complete the procedures in this course, you will use practice files provided in a folder on the McGrath Learning Center workstation computer that you will be using in class. You should bring a USB flash drive (any size) with you to copy these files for practice at home and to save your work in class.
To get the most benefit from the course, you should already possess skills in managing files (opening, saving, re-naming, copying, etc.) in Windows XP and in using the keyboard and mouse. If you don't know how to implement the direction, "Open the file named LESSON.XLS that is found in the folder Student Disk/ExcelStudentFiles on the C: drive," you should consider taking SeniorNet's Introduction to Computers or the Introduction to Windows XP course before you take Excel.
At the end of the course you should be able to:
- Create and use an Excel workbook
- Design worksheets, enter data in them, and automate calculations
- Change the format of a workbook for on-screen viewing or printing
- Prepare and print reports and charts of your information
- Use a pivot table to organize and summarize your information
