1. SPREADSHEET APPLICATIONS
Students will understand spreadsheet technology and how to use spreadsheets appropriately to solve business problems.

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3. COMMON SPREADSHEET APPLICATIONS
Budgets, business and personal **
Payroll **
Inventory
Invoices **
Balance sheets
Profit-loss statements
Income tax preparation
Currency conversion
Basically any use that requires calculations or charts
** - Illustrated in this lesson
There are an unlimited number of types of spreadsheet applications. However, following are a few of the more common ones: budgets, payroll, inventory, invoices, financial statements, tax preparation, currency conversions, and any other use that requires calculations and/or charts.
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4. Budget Illustration
This is an example of a budget spreadsheet and an explanation of some of the formulas used. These are simple but commonly-used formulas such as adding and subtracting.
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5. Payroll illustration
Payroll formulas can be complicated if the user has a weakness with percentages. Again, the formulas used here are also adding as well as multiplying and using an AVERAGE function. You could also have manually typed each character of the AVERAGE formula but I used the Ʃ AutoSum function instead.
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6. INVOICE ILLUSTRATION
Invoices can also be created in a spreadsheet program. This combines word processing with spreadsheet technology so formulas can be calculated easily.
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7. Common formulas
All mathematical operations: sum (+), difference (-), multiply (*), divide (/)
Average
Max - highest
Min - lowest
Count – number of
Some of the most common formulas include the four mathematical operations as well as functions using AutoSum (Ʃ) which automatically inserts all characters of a formula. The most common ones used are Sum, Average, Max, Min, and Count.
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8. SPREADSHEET ENHANCEMENTS
Number styles, for example, accounting style
Borders
Cell formatting such as dates and percentages
Highlighting using conditional formatting
Charts and graphs
Font formatting including size, color, and alignment
Plain black and white text by itself is normally not appealing to any audience. However, when shading, borders, appropriate number, date and text formatting, in addition to charts/graphs, makes the information presented more interesting and visually appealing.
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9. Commonly-used chart types
Column – usually compares >1 item vertically
Line – can compare >1 item or items over time
Pie – compares parts related to a whole, can ‘explode’ a slice for emphasis
Bar - usually compares >1 item horizontally
Area – similar to column but can show parts of a whole over time
Many times data can be much more easily understood when it is presented graphically as opposed to text alone. Many different chart types exist which can present the data in more readable format. The most common are column, line, pie, bar, and area charts.
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10. Illustrations of different chart types
The charts on the next few slides are based upon the Projected Expenses from the Budget Illustration Slide 3.
To get an idea of a few of the popular chart types, the following slides use the same data but present it in different ways depending upon the chart type.
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11. Sample column chart
This is an example of a column chart comparing types of expenses with the dollar amount of the expenses.
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12. Sample line chart
Right-click in the chart area and you can change the chart type from column to line etc.
This is a sample line chart which displays data in a line. Markers can be included to more visually show where the intersection of the expense and the amount are.
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13. Pie charts should include data labels of percentages.
Sample pie chart
Pie charts should include data labels of percentages.
This is a sample pie chart. Pie charts are more effective when they include percentages as opposed to values on each pie slice.
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14. Sample bar chart
A bar chart is similar to a column chart except that the bars are horizontal.
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15. Sample area chart
Area charts are most effective with >1 set of data, but this provides an example of what it looks like.
Area charts are similar to column, bar, and line charts. The data is displayed with more depth when there is more than one set of data being compared.
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16. Independent practice assignments
Shopping Cart Assignment #1 – Students are to go on a shopping spree with $2,000. They may conduct Internet research to purchase at least ten different items of their choice (not 10 in quantity, but 10 different items in any quantity of each item that they want). They are to create a spreadsheet listing a Description of each item, the Unit Price, the Quantity, the Amount (quantity x unit price), Sales Tax (amount x 8.25%) and Total Amount (amount + sales tax). At the bottom of the Total Amount column there should be a Grand Total using a Sum formula. The students’ totals should be within $10 of the $2,000 without going over. It is generally easier to input the column headings and formulas prior to the costs and items so students can see as they work how close they are getting to their $2,000 Grand Total. Students should include formulas for a Maximum and Minimum Unit Price. To enhance the spreadsheet, borders and shading (somewhere) should be included.
Class Survey Assignment #2 – Depending upon the class size, students should individually or in pairs, create a minimum ten-question survey to ask each student in the class. The topic should be
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17. Independent practice assignment (continued)
appropriate or the teacher can assign topics. After students receive all responses, they will create a spreadsheet with the questions (shorten or abbreviate if necessary) and the number of responses. Then they will create a chart type of their choice including a chart title, axis titles if necessary (depends upon chart type), data labels, and enhancements such as shading, borders, or font formatting.
Student Budget Assignment #3 – Students, in pairs, are to create a spreadsheet that displays their income and expenses when they graduate from college or high school. They are to research web sites (or use their personal experiences) to determine an approximate monthly income from a job and appropriate monthly expenses such as rent, car payment, cell phone, food, entertainment, savings, and other expenses they will be responsible for. At least ten different expenses should be included. A column should include income, expenses, (below the income), and another column will have the dollar amounts. The spreadsheet should include appropriate formulas to show total income, total expenses, and the difference between the two, whether it be positive or negative. Then the students should prepare two different types of graphs displaying information from the spreadsheet. One document should be turned in which includes the spreadsheet and the graph. The web sites used should also be included on the document. Attractive and professional formatting should be included as well.
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