Structure Your Tables

Quick reference

• 00:04 There are many ways to display information in PowerPoint, whether it be charts, pictures, or various diagrams, and this video’s about one of
• 00:10 those ways and it’s tables: getting them onto a PowerPoint slide, getting them designed very efficiently, and generally working with them
• 00:17 because sooner or later, whether it’s financial or scientific data, you’ll probably need a table. So there’s a number of ways that we can insert a
• 00:24 table. Firstly, we go to the insert tab of the ribbon, the table drop down button, and that gives us four different options. We can insert a
• 00:33 table by selecting from these predefined rows and column ranges, and as my mouse move over the cells, the highlight changes and that
• 00:40 show us what we’re going to select. And notice, also, that the preview of the table on the slide updates as I move my mouse around, and when
• 00:48 I select a particular range, I would click on that bounding cell and that table would be dropped onto our slide. But alternatively, we can click the
• 00:58 insert table menu item and that gives us a dialog box to type into, or we can use the spinner to select a specific number of columns and rows.
• 01:06 Now notice that the default is 5 columns and 2 rows. So I’ll cancel that. We can draw a table with our mouse and our mouse curser turns into
• 01:17 a pencil but note that this is really about only drawing the outside boundary box of the table and we need then to populate our table with
• 01:24 rows and columns in order to get the cells that we need. And also, we can insert a Microsoft Excel spread sheet. Now this option is not so
• 01:33 much about browsing to an existing file, but embedding the Excel application within our slide to work within, clicking outside of the application
• 01:42 returns us to PowerPoint, while double clicking the Excel table-like icon take us back into the Excel application. In addition to commands on
• 01:52 the ribbon we can also insert a table from within a content placeholder on a slide. Notice this insert table icon, and that also gives us the
• 02:01 same dialog box that we saw before with the default five columns and two rows. Now content placeholders are really the subject of another
• 02:08 video. And I’ll just click ok, but also, we can of course copy a range of cells from within, say, Excel, and then switch to PowerPoint and paste
• 02:19 them in and we would use the smart tag to select our paste options such as whether we want to use the destination style or keep the
• 02:26 source formatting and so on and you can explore these options when you have time. Now within this range of cells on the slide I’m going
• 02:33 to paste in some tabular or table type information that I already have on the clipboard, so CTRL V and there is our information. Now if
• 02:43 we go to the very last cell, and that is the last column and last row which is really the last available cell, notice that if I press ENTER I get
• 02:51 a new line to BACKSPACE to take that new line out, but if I press TAB on the keyboard I get a new row and that’s a very simple way to add
• 02:59 new rows so that you can put your information in the table, so in the table style option group, we can highlight the header row, the total row and
• 03:10 rows to contrast the rows between each other or we can highlight the first or last column as well as band the columns to highlight the difference
• 03:18 between the columns and so that’s mostly about options to give you contrast in your table to increase the clarity of it when you present.
• 03:27 Notice also the various table styles and they help enormously with the formatting and to a certain extent, the style of your table. The table
• 03:35 styles that you will see will differ from theme to theme, so once you change the theme your table styles will also change. So I can select
• 03:44 from a range of styles that are available, such as best match for the document or light, medium, or dark, so I’m just simply going to select a
• 03:52 particular style that works well. Notice also options to change shading, borders, and various effects of the table, and of course these options,
• 04:03 particularly the effects options, are not as extensive as working with shapes. There are also options to draw a table as well as an
• 04:11 eraser, which will help you remove cell lines, which is equivalent to merging cells, so CTRL Z to undo that, or this little undo button on the
• 04:21 Quick Access Toolbar. Another tab worth exploring is the layout tab which is all about manipulating the table itself, so you can view the
• 04:29 gridlines if they’re available. You can delete rows and columns, as well as the entire table itself. You can insert rows above or below or columns
• 04:38 to the left and right. Notice how the information in the current table moves based on which option I select. We can merge cells or split
• 04:47 them as well as ways to distribute rows and cell borders and manipulate the alignment and the table size and so on. Now there are various
• 04:56 keyboard shortcuts that also work with text in a table. If I type into this cell, cities and then use the keyboard shortcut of CTRL E which is to
• 05:04 center text, it’s immediately applied to the text within that cell. Other keyboard shortcuts well worth your time to explore and you will get some
• 05:12 experience with those over time. And of course there are some options that are available if you right click on various parts of a table. So in
• 05:20 summary, there’s numerous ways to insert a table. You can use the insert tab on the ribbon, and the little drop down item, a content
• 05:29 placeholder or even use another application such as Microsoft Excel. On the design tab you get table style options as well as the table
• 05:37 styles themselves and various formatting effects and the ability to draw or erase parts of a table. The layout tab is about working with the table
• 05:45 itself such as rows and columns, merging cells or changing alignment and size and so on. Naturally, you don’t need to overuse tables but
• 05:55 they are an important option to use as part of a suite of text, diagrams, pictures, and charts, and you can draw upon tables to use to
• 06:05 effectively present with your presentation.

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