Course description

This course teaches you to use Microsoft Word and PowerPoint confidently for everyday work: letters, notices, CVs, handbooks, reports and presentations that look tidy, are easy to read and don't fall apart when someone else opens them. It's written for adults in the UK who are going back to work, changing jobs, or simply want to stop fighting with documents and slides.

It starts from the beginning and builds good habits as it goes: styles instead of hand formatting, tab stops instead of spaces, tables instead of lined-up text, placeholders instead of loose text boxes. Each skill is shown with numbered steps on Windows, with notes for the Mac and the web versions where they differ.

There are 10 sections and 50 written lessons. You follow Juanita, who started as an office administrator at a small tool hire firm after some years away from work, as she tidies a price notice, a staff handbook, letters and a customer guide, builds an induction presentation and finishes with a report and a matching set of slides. Every section has a practice pack with a worksheet, example answers and Word and PowerPoint files to work on, each with a finished version to compare against, plus checklists and shortcut cards.

What you'll learn

• Getting started: which versions of Word and PowerPoint you have, the Word window and ribbon, saving to OneDrive with clear file names, Undo and everyday shortcuts.
• Typing, editing and formatting text: selecting, copying and moving text, Find and Replace, fonts, paragraph spacing, tab stops instead of spaces, and bulleted and numbered lists.
• Styles and longer documents: heading styles, the Navigation pane, page breaks, an automatic contents list, headers, footers, page numbers and page layout.
• Tables, pictures and shapes: building and formatting tables, adding and cropping pictures with alt text, simple shapes and icons, and a one-page notice.
• Letters, CVs, templates and mail merge: a UK business letter, a clean single-column CV, your own templates, a mail merge to a customer list, and short reports and memos.
• Checking, reviewing and sharing: Editor, comments and Track Changes, sharing from OneDrive, the Accessibility Checker, saving a PDF and printing.
• PowerPoint basics: the PowerPoint window, starting a presentation, text in placeholders, themes, the Slide Master, Designer and organising slides into sections.
• Pictures, diagrams and charts on slides: pictures and icons, lining shapes up, SmartArt, charts and tables, and transitions and animations used sparingly.
• Presenting and sharing: speaker notes, rehearsing, Presenter view, accessible slides, exporting and sharing, and working between Word and PowerPoint.
• Final project: a short work report in Word with a contents list, a table and a chart, checked and saved as a PDF, and a matching presentation of eight slides.

Who it's for

Adults in the UK who need everyday Word and PowerPoint skills for work: people returning to work, career changers, new office and admin staff, and anyone who has picked things up as they went along and wants to fill the gaps. You need Word and PowerPoint (the desktop apps through Microsoft 365, or the free web versions) and a computer with a keyboard and mouse or trackpad.

What this course is, and isn't

It teaches the two apps as tools for work documents and presentations. It doesn't go deep into slide design, presenting on video calls, writing the words of a CV, email or spreadsheets, which have courses of their own. Copilot is covered briefly and carefully: what it is, that it needs the right licence, and why you check everything it writes. Microsoft changes its apps often, so the lessons describe features by what they do and where they usually are, and tell you what to search for if a button has moved.

What will I learn?

• Find your way round Word and PowerPoint on Windows, with notes for the Mac and web versions, and save files to OneDrive with clear names
• Type, edit and format text in Word, using paragraph spacing, tab stops and lists instead of spaces and extra Enter presses
• Use heading styles, the Navigation pane, an automatic contents list, headers, footers and page numbers in longer documents
• Build and format tables, add and crop pictures with alt text, and put together a one-page notice
• Lay out a UK business letter and a clean CV, make your own templates and run a mail merge to a customer list
• Check, review and share documents with Editor, comments, Track Changes, the Accessibility Checker and PDF
• Build clear presentations with placeholders, themes, the Slide Master, sections, pictures, SmartArt and charts
• Rehearse with speaker notes, present with Presenter view, check slides for accessibility and share them
• Produce a short work report in Word and a matching presentation of eight slides

Frequently asked questions