# Week 2 Announcements

## Monday: This Week in CSIS 1 — Word Processing & Spreadsheets

Hey everyone -

Week 2. This is the hands-on week — you're going to build things.

**This week you'll be able to:**
- Create, format, and save a document with proper paragraph styles, headers, and page layout
- Use Find & Replace, spell check, and basic editing tools
- Build a spreadsheet with formulas (SUM, AVERAGE, COUNT, IF)
- Explain the difference between relative and absolute cell references
- Create a chart from spreadsheet data

**What's due this week (all due Sunday 11:59 PM):**
- Practice Quiz (unlimited attempts)
- Discussion: "What was hardest this week? What strategy did you use to figure it out?"
- Real-World Task #1: Create a formatted document (letter or resume)
- Real-World Task #2: Build a personal budget spreadsheet with formulas and a chart
- Weekly Check-In Quiz (2 attempts)

Two assignments this week — start early. The spreadsheet one takes longer than you think.

**Readings:** OpenStax Ch. 3 (Creating Documents), Ch. 4 (Document Preparation), and Ch. 9 (Spreadsheets). Links are in the Module 2 page.

**Monday Demo tonight** — I'll build a document and a spreadsheet from scratch, live. This is probably the most useful demo of the whole course. Zoom link in Module 2.

-peter h

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## Wednesday: Mid-Week Check-In

Hey everyone -

Two tips for this week:

**The #1 document formatting mistake:** Using the spacebar or Enter key to position things on the page. If you're hitting Enter 15 times to get to a new page, use a Page Break instead (Ctrl+Enter). If you're using spaces to line up columns, use tab stops. The document will look right on your screen but break on someone else's — or when you change one thing and everything shifts.

**Spreadsheet formulas:** Start every formula with `=`. If you type `SUM(A1:A5)` without the equals sign, it's just text. Also — when your formula isn't working, check for typos in cell references. `A1` is not the same as `A 1`.

**Question I keep getting:** "Can I use Google Docs instead of Word?" Yes. Absolutely. Either one works. The concepts are the same — just the menus look a little different.

Start the budget spreadsheet soon if you haven't. It takes a bit of setup and the formulas can be tricky the first time.

-peter

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## Friday: Week Wrap-Up

Hey everyone -

Week 2 wrap-up:

**Due Sunday 11:59 PM:** Both assignments (document + spreadsheet), the discussion, and the quiz.

**Common mistakes I'm seeing:**
- On the document: not using paragraph styles (Heading 1, Heading 2, etc.). Manually making text big and bold isn't the same thing — styles give your document structure.
- On the spreadsheet: using a calculator to get the answer and then typing it into the cell. The whole point is letting the spreadsheet do the math. Use `=SUM(B2:B10)`, not `=247`.
- On the quiz: people are confusing "Save" with "Save As." Save overwrites the current file. Save As lets you create a new copy with a different name or format.

**Next week:** Presentations, databases, and networking. You'll build a short presentation, learn what databases actually are (spoiler: they're everywhere), and find out how your computer talks to the internet. Also — heads up — July 4th is Friday, so enjoy the holiday.

-peter h