| This book is written by three teachers and a guy who teaches Excel. As the latter, I give all of the credit for this book to Adrienne, Bill H. and Colleen – it was their logic of classroom needs that made the book what it is. The population of teachers writing this book mirrors the real population – some know Excel well and some are new to Excel.
If you learn every concept in the 25 examples in this book, you will be an Excel guru. Even if you only use a few of the topics, you will find yourself comfortable with Excel. If you don’t want to learn anything about Excel, then just download the sample applications and use them in the classroom. Sample files can be downloaded from this secret page:
http://www.MrExcel.com/teacherfiles.html.
The concepts in this book apply equally well to every version of Excel from Excel 97 through Excel 2003. As this book goes to press, pre-beta copies of Excel 12 are available. I’ve reviewed these and many concepts will be different in Excel 12. While Excel 12 threatens to make every Excel book obsolete, most public school districts are in financial trouble and will not be upgrading to Excel 12 soon. If you happen to live in a district that upgrades to Excel 12, check the aforementioned web page for information about an e-book upgrade for Excel 12 users.
Addressing a classroom teacher's need to simultaneously manage a classroom full of students, meet state-mandated assessment standards for students, and track students' performance against a rubric, this overview of Excel shows how to put its features to use immediately in a classroom. Tracking attendance, grades, and books in the school library, creating reports to share with parents at parent–teacher conference time, and teaching basic charting concepts in a mathematics class are among the possible uses of Excel covered in this guide. |