Office Suite Overview

In this document, we'll be going over each of the Microsoft Office suite products and what they individually do as well as how they interact with each other. One thing to note is that the Microsoft Suite allows users to access these programs from anywhere with an internet connection. Traditionally, Office products have just been desktop applications but now Microsoft works on more new features for the web version of their programs. (You can access these at: https://office.com/) As a district, we have full scale Office licenses available for any staff member or student. This document will serve as an onboarding document for those new to the Office line of products or a refresher for existing district members.

Outlook

Outlook is our email client. This allows for communications between district members. This tool let's users organize their emails, set priorities, and access shared mailboxes. There's also a calendar built into Outlook that allows users to share invites to events, meetings, etc. 

Teams

This is our primary classroom software that teachers can use. We currently enroll students automatically into the Teams that are managed by their teachers. Teams lets teachers break down their courses into subjects and different pages, allowing them to organize their course materials so students can access them. Through Teams teachers can post lecture notes, assign homework to students, and share entire sections of their courses with others. Users can upload documents, spreadsheets, and PowerPoints to share with other team members.

OneDrive

Cloud-based storage has become mainstream and OneDrive is Microsoft's answer to that. OneDrive empowers users to backup their data and access it from anywhere with an internet connection. You can store anything from documents, presentations, or pictures in OneDrive. Many teachers choose to automatically sync and backup any documents they make with OneDrive.

OneNote

OneNote is a digital workbook that allows users to create different sections of notes. You can organize, share, and create notes that can be freely edited. This is a very helpful collaboration tool that allows users to create entire documents. Unlike saved documents, OneNote can be edited live, so any changes that need to be made can be made without having to worry about sending out the correct version of a specific document.

Word

Probably the most popular program on this list, Word is the best tool for creating documents. Anyone who uses word can create anything from essays and homework to resumes and contracts. Word is used almost every day by the majority of the Microsoft users in our district. 

Excel

This program is used to generate spreadsheets that can be used for a variety of purposes.  Many people use Excel for organizing data, managing finances, purchase orders, or just creating generic lists. The mathematically computations you can make in Excel make this a particularly useful tool for those in finance or have an interest in mathematics.

PowerPoint

Slideshows can be used to present information to viewers. This is a leading professional tool and is frequently used in meetings, classrooms, and various other presentation formats. The templates that come included in PowerPoint prove useful for just about every user that has access to this program.

Forms

Forms is frequently used for polling and collecting data from a group of people. Microsoft Forms are highly editable which allow them to be used from anything from collecting attendance, to polling thoughts about a recent change, or just for collecting users names. This tool allows users to create forms that have anonymous results if that is desired. Be careful who you send forms to, however, because someone outside of your ideal sample range may answer!