Documents, Spreadsheets, and Presentations

Three tools, three different tasks

When in doubt, ask yourself what you really need: long running text, word processor; data and calculations, spreadsheet; showing something visually, presentations.

Which suite do I work with?

All three tools come together in an office suite. There are three paths:

Why does it matter? This is the issue of technological dependence: a school that pays for licenses or stores everything on a single company's platform depends on that company. Free software can be copied, installed, and used at no charge, even at a school with few resources.

The word processor window and page format

The window of a word processor is divided into four areas:

The spell checker

The spell checker underlines (usually in red) the words that are not in its dictionary. Some also flag simple grammar errors. It does not understand the meaning of the sentence.

Styles, table of contents, and templates

A style is a saved set of formatting (font, size, color, spacing) with a name: "Heading 1," "Heading 2," "Body Text." Applying one doesn't only change the look: it tells the word processor what role that text has.

Why? Because the word processor knows which text is a heading, it can collect the headings into the automatic table of contents and update the page numbers. And if you change the style once, all the headings in the document change.

For the table of contents to be generated, the document must have its headings in heading styles (Heading 1, Heading 2…), not in big letters made "by hand." When the paper grows and the pages change, right-click on the table of contents and choose Update (in LibreOffice, "Update Index"). The cover page is made on a separate page, before the table of contents.

Templates

A template is a model document that is already prepared. Every new file you create from it inherits its format. If your school has an official template, using it guarantees that all papers look uniform and meet the guidelines without having to adjust them by hand. When you create your own, define:

• the fonts (for example, one for headings and another for body text);

• the styles for headings and text, with their sizes and line spacing;

• the cover page (school name, subject, student name);

• the margins and page numbering.

Images and tables inside the document

When you insert a photo, the word processor treats it as an object with a wrapping setting:

• In line with text: the image behaves like an enormous letter; it takes up its own line and doesn't move the rest.

• Text wrapping around it: the text arranges itself around the image, which you can place next to the paragraph it illustrates.

To illustrate a specific paragraph without breaking the layout, "in line" works well if it sits alone between paragraphs, or "text wrapping" if it goes next to the paragraph it explains. Without wrapping, the photo pushes all the text around and messes it up.

Tables

For data in rows and columns (a schedule, a list of materials), use a table and not tab stops. With tabs, as soon as one word is longer than the others, everything shifts out of place. A table readjusts itself and supports borders, color, and merged cells.

For the class schedule: Insert › Table › 3 columns (for example, Time, Subject, Classroom) and as many rows as there are hours; type in each cell and format the header row.

The spreadsheet: formulas that work on their own

If you change a piece of data, all the formulas that depend on it recalculate on their own. That's why the spreadsheet is so useful for calculations that may vary.

Absolute references

Sometimes a piece of data must stay fixed when copying (a percentage, a single price). It is fixed with the dollar sign: $F$1 always points to F1. This is the absolute reference. With F1 without the signs, the reference would shift.

Functions, sorting, and filtering

A function is a ready-made formula. In Mexican Spanish they are written like this, with arguments separated by commas and decimals with a point:

Why? These functions are measures of central tendency (mean, median, mode) and of spread (the maximum and minimum give the range: =MAX(B2:B6)-MIN(B2:B6); DESVEST gives the standard deviation). They summarize each data set with just a few numbers.

Grades from five exams: 6, 7, 8, 8, 10. Try changing the data:

Here the mean is $39/5 = 7.8$, the median is $8$, the mode is $8$, and the range is $10-6=4$. Free programs such as Jamovi or JASP do this analysis in more detail.

Sorting and filtering without breaking the data

Imagine a table with A (First name), B (Last name), C (Group), and D (Final grade). Each row is a record: its four pieces of data go together.

A verifiable budget and charts

A good budget sheet has this structure: A: item, B: quantity, C: unit price, D: amount. Type quantities and prices as numbers; the currency is applied with the cell format, not by typing it.

Budget for the end-of-year field trip

For 28 students: bus $\$4{,}200$ in total; admission tickets $\$80$ per student; lunch $\$70$ per student (example figures).

Results: $4{,}200$, $2{,}240$, and $1{,}960$; grand total $\$8{,}400$; per person $\$300$. Even better: store the 28 in a cell (for example B7) and type =D5/B7, so that if the group changes, it recalculates on its own.

Which chart to use

For the budget, the split of spending among bus, tickets, and lunch is shown with a pie chart, with a title and percentage labels. A chart in the sheet updates on its own when the data change.

Presentations that communicate

A slide should support what you say, not replace it. If you fill it with a paragraph and read it aloud, the audience stops listening to you in order to read the screen.

A slide about photosynthesis could say only: "Photosynthesis: light + CO₂ + water → food + oxygen," with a drawing of a leaf. You tell the rest.

Speaker notes

They are a space that only the presenter sees. There you write what you want to say (data, examples, the sequence of ideas, a figure that is hard to remember), not the speech word for word. With them you can keep the slides clean and not read from them.

How many slides?

A presentation of 40 slides loaded with text and with every animation loses the audience: the main idea can't be told apart. One with 10 plain slides, with one idea per slide, communicates better. A reasonable rule of thumb is at most one slide per minute of presentation, and each one should be understandable in five seconds.

Accessible presentations

A slide must be readable by someone with poor vision or someone sitting at the back of the room. Three basic criteria:

• Contrast: dark text on a light background (or the other way around). Light gray on white is almost unreadable.

• Size: large letters (as a reference, 24 points or more for the text).

• Images with a purpose: they should not cover the text; decorative ones should be discreet, and informative ones should have alt text.

Improvements for the slide in the problem: (1) switch to dark text on a light background, so it can be read from far away; (2) increase the font size; (3) move or remove the photo so it doesn't cover the title, and give it alt text if it provides information. That way the message reaches everyone, not just the people in the front row.

Sharing, formats, and teamwork

Why? A PDF fixes the position of every element and embeds the fonts, so it looks the same on any device. Teachers prefer it because (1) the layout doesn't fall apart when opened on another computer or phone and (2) it prevents accidental or last-minute changes to what was submitted.

Open and proprietary formats

An open format has a public specification, and any program can implement it (for example, OpenDocument: .odt, .ods, .odp; also PDF and CSV). A proprietary format belongs to a company and is designed for its programs (many formats from the paid suites).

When "incompatible format" appears, it is because the program you are opening doesn't understand that format or its version. Two solutions: (1) ask for the file as a PDF or in an open format; (2) install a free suite that opens and saves several formats (or open it in a cloud suite). With complex formats the layout may change, so it's a good idea to check the result.

Teamwork workflow

A reasonable order: (1) each person finishes their part in their own tool; (2) the person doing the calculations exports the charts as images and, if needed, the table as an image or copies its values; (3) the person doing the text exports what will be shown (headings, key phrases) or copies it; (4) whoever lays out the presentation gathers everything and (5) the final PDF is generated, and an editable copy of each part is kept. Typical problems: formatting that changes when pasting, fonts missing on another computer, charts that are no longer linked to the data, different versions of the same file, and confusing file names.

Mail merge

Mail merge sends personalized letters to many people: a base letter with fields and a table with the data. For 120 invitations to a parent-teacher meeting, the spreadsheet must have one column per piece of data and one row per person:

If everything is mixed in a single column ("Student name, Group, Date and Time"), the word processor can't separate the data: it doesn't know where each one starts and ends and can't insert just the name or just the time.

Base letter (the fields between « »):

"Dear family of «Student name», in group «Group»: we invite you to the parent-teacher meeting on «Date» at «Time». We appreciate your attendance."

The fields are inserted at the exact place where each piece of data will go (in LibreOffice Writer, with Insert › Field › More Fields, or with the Tools › Mail Merge Wizard). When merging, one letter is generated for each row.

Back to the beginning: if the job consists of writing long explanations, choose the word processor; if it includes calculations that may change, the spreadsheet; and if you have to defend it in front of the class, a plain supporting presentation. For submitting, a PDF.

Summary