Hold the Atl key and type 9742 to create a telephone symbol

Knowledge of computers is essential today for everyone, especially students. Computers are used in almost every aspect of education, from research and writing to taking tests and collaborating with classmates. Students who are computer literate are better able to succeed in school and prepare for their future careers.

This means that you have to be proficient in using Microsoft Office since it is commonly used in schools and the workplace. Microsoft Office includes a wide range of applications like Word, Excel, PowerPoint, and more. This can help students to learn how to organise their thoughts and ideas and create presentations and reports.

According to Suvarna Lokhande, PGT-Info Practices at Apeejay School, Kharghar, learning shortcuts in MS Office can help students boost their efficiency and confidence using different apps and technologies. “There are several keyboard shortcuts that you can use to write, edit, and format documents quickly and easily. These word keyboard shortcuts let you perform common tasks like saving, inserting page breaks, and changing fonts without touching the mouse,” Lokhande said, who has been teaching for 16 years now.

A few simple and useful shortcuts for students in Word are:

1.       Open a document: Press Ctrl + O to open an existing document.

2.       Create a new document: Press Ctrl + N to create a new, untitled document.

3.       Save the current document: Press Ctrl + S to save the current document immediately.

4.       Close the current document: Press Ctrl + W to close the current document. If it hasn’t been saved, Word will ask if you want to save it. 

5.       Make the font smaller: Press Ctrl and the left bracket ([) to make the font smaller one point at a time.

6.       Make the font bigger: Press Ctrl and the right bracket (]) to make the font larger one point at a time.

7.       Change text to uppercase: Press Ctrl + Shift + A to change the selected text to all uppercase.

8.       Change text to lowercase: Press Ctrl + Shift K to change the selected text to all lowercase.

9.       Select everything in the document: Press Ctrl + A to select the entire document.

10.   Select text one character at a time: Press Shift + Arrow to select text to the left or right, one character at a time.

11.   Select text one word at a time: Press Ctrl + Shift + Arrow to select words one at a time to the left or right.

General Task

Undo: Perhaps the most common shortcut of all time, Press Ctrl + Z to undo your last action.

Redo: Press Ctrl + Y to redo the last action, if possible. If Word can’t repeat the action, nothing will happen.

Help: Press F1 to open the Help and Support pane.

Useful shortcuts for students in Excel

Excel supports a plethora of keyboard shortcuts that help you work efficiently and increase productivity.  “Instead of accessing the toolbar with a mouse, two or three keystrokes are used to perform significant functions,” Lokhande explained and shared a few shortcuts.

1.       To create a new workbook: Ctrl + N

2.       To open an existing workbook: Ctrl + O

3.       To save a workbook/spreadsheet: Ctrl + S

4.       To close Excel: Ctrl + F4

5.       To move to the next sheet: Ctrl + Page Down

6.       To move to the previous sheet: Ctrl + Page Up

These are the Excel shortcuts that can help you navigate through your spreadsheet. Once the workbook creation is done, the next key step is cell formatting.

“A cell in Excel holds all the data that you are working on. Several different shortcuts can be applied to a cell, such as editing a cell, aligning cell contents, adding a border to a cell, adding an outline to all the selected cells, and many more,” Lokhande said.

To edit a cell: F2

To copy and paste cells: Ctrl + C, Ctrl + V

To move to the next cell: Tab

To move to the previous cell: Shift + Tab

To write in the same cell on the next line: Alt + Enter

Cell formatting shortcuts

To display find and replace: Ctrl + H

To insert a hyperlink: Ctrl + k

To select the entire row: Shift + Space

To select the entire column: Ctrl + Space

“A shortcut is a way to save time and work smarter. This can include a keyboard shortcut where a combination of keystrokes helps us avoid clicking through a drop-down menu to follow multiple steps to accomplish a task. Students save time on the clock as well as the energy that goes along with clicking a lot of extra buttons or needing extra keystrokes to complete a task,” Lokhande shared and said that shortcut keys are also known as hotkeys.

A fun activity: Create a telephone symbol in Word!

·         Open Microsoft Word.

·         Place your cursor where you want to insert the telephone symbol.

·         For Windows: Press and hold the Alt key on your keyboard. Holding Alt, type: For a landline telephone symbol: 9742; for mobile phone symbol: 9749