E5: Consistency & Templates

In the technology world, consistency and uniformity are very good things. People will find your documents easier to read if you use a consistent format throughout. Code is easier to parse if a person uses the same arrangement each time. Spreadsheets are easier to understand if they follow a standard format. Because of this, many programs are designed to handle your repetitive tasks with ease and more consistency than you could ever manually do yourself.

Programs offer various ways to provide consistency in your documents. Templates provide a consistent structure and style. Styles allow you to create consistent formatting for characters, paragraphs, and other formatting elements. Themes or palettes can help you be consistent in your colors. These examples are from the documentation world; however, you will find this to be true in many fields. For example, in web design, you have tools like CSS (Cascading Style Sheets) to help with consistency.

Usually, to take advantage of these automated services, you must take some time to set up the file. This next exercise will take you through using and adjusting a template. Not only will it challenge you to use your technological adaptability skills, but it will also help you understand some of the tools Word provides for consistency.

Using a Template

This exercise will walk you through adjusting a template for a tri-fold brochure in Microsoft Word.

1. Choose a topic for your brochure. It can be a real brochure for a business or an event. It could be on your favorite hobby, music group, or TV show. For this exercise, pick a subject you know about—you want your focus to be on the technology, not the content.
2. Open a new document using a tri-fold brochure template. (hint: File —> New, then search for a tri-fold brochure)
3. Manually change the color theme to the one you desire. (hint: Customize colors)
4. Change the Heading 2 style to another font and color. (hint: Modify style)
5. Add an automatic underline to the Heading 1 style. (hint: add a border to a style)
6. Add a thin line at the top running across all three panels. (hint: Edit Header/Edit Footer)
7. Is your spacing all messed up now? Has an extra page been added? If yes, how you fix it will be determined by the template you are using. Some use tables and some use text boxes. Change the height of your table or text boxes so you do not have an extra page.
8. Replace the pictures in the template with your own pictures or pictures from the web. (hint: change picture)
9. Add your text content by copying and pasting.
10. Format your content using the template.
11. Save the file.
12. Turn the file in, if applicable.

You should end with a brochure that has a consistent look and feel throughout. Templates and styles help us develop such consistency.