Microsoft Excel

I have seen how Excel is great for graphs and for data. It can be great in the classroom to teach students graphing. Yet when I saw we were doing Excel, I cringed a little. My relationship with Excel has been very up and down. I have played around with it a couple of times. I do not really know how to use Excel and I haven't had much of a reason to use Excel. Also, most people I know do not know how to use Excel. 

I went into the tutorial not feeling confident. Of course the first steps are easy. I know how to open a new document. As I was going through the tutorial though I had to walk away and come back a few times. Simple things like cells were really bugging me.

It also took some time to learn how to make a graph. Simple things like learning how to change the data in the graph or labeling it took time. Mail merge is starting to make a little more sense but I am still not 100% sure if I will ever use it.

Another thing was that it was a challenge to try and make a crossword puzzle using Excel. I had never done that before so I was up to the challenge. Well, it was definitely a challenge. I eventually had to look for more tips online to help me figure out what I was doing. After an hour some things just suddenly clicked and I was having an A-HA moment.

The more I play around with Excel, the more comfortable I am with it. This can lead to a whole other topic on teachers and technology training that I will save for a rainy day (or since its the Fall Semester maybe a snowy day coming up soon).

I know I am not an Excel expert by any means. I think there is even more than can be done with it that I don't know about. I wonder if students would be willing to learn with me if I use it in a classroom. I also wonder if they would be able to understand it better than me and if they would find it easy to use. I will have to try it in my classroom one day and see what happens.