Cockeyed Optimist

It’s very tempting, when you are starting to write your assignment or essay, to click ‘New Blank Document’ on Word’s ‘File’ menu and start right in typing your stuff; your head’s full of ideas, so you want to get them all down,

Whoa! Hang on a bit!

There’s a few things you can do now that will save you grief (or at least, time) later on.

1. Give the file a sensible name. If you don’t, and just hit ‘Save’ after you’ve been typing a while, Word will give it a name based on the first few words in your file.
   So you could end up with a whole lot of files called “PSYCH101″ or something.And don’t skimp on the filename: “Essay on Adam Smith Wealth of Nations” is going to mean a lot more to you in a few weeks or months than “Economics Essay”.
2. Put the file where you can find it again, don’t just let Word put it where it wants to. Put it in a folder of your choice; set one up now.
3. And, while you are about it, think about a hierarchy of folders.I noticed the other day that my son, Oli, who is in the second year of his Science/Law degree, has a series of folders called “Semester 1 2006″, right up to “Semester 2 2010″, with folders inside these named for each of the subjects he’s doing, “LAWS1000″ and so on (I didn’t tell him to do this, he thought it out himself!)This is going to be very helpful later on!
4. And set up a few Word preferences before they turn round and bite you.
   • Pick a font and size you like, otherwise you might be doing everything in 12 point Verdana, and look like a geek.
   • Set the paper size (in ‘Page Setup’) to what you actually use where you are; Word might have chosen ‘US Letter’ when you are really in Europe and want to be using ‘A4′.
   • Think about margins (this will come up later, when you are checking what your school or professor has specified for the assignment).
   • And set the line spacing now (single, one-and-a-half or double), again according to what is required. If you don’t do it now it can be done later, but you might have page overflows you weren’t expecting.
5. A final thing, and then you can start typing; check whether Word is showing all the toolbars you like to use. This varies between different versions of Word, and different operating systems, so I can’t be too detailed; just check the ‘View’ menu, and see whether the items you want have been checked.While you are doing this, make sure you will be working in ‘Normal’ or ‘Page View’, whichever you prefer (I like ‘Page View’).

So, now, off you go! If you want, download this lesson.

Have a look at other tutorials in this set, you might find them useful as you start building up your document.
Back to the main menu for this tutorial.

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