Inserting and Formatting a Table

When you want to present a lot of data in an organized and easy-to-read format, a table is often your best choice. On a slide that includes a content placeholder, you can click the placeholder's Insert Table button to start the process of creating a table. You can also click the Table button in the Tables Group on the Insert tab to add a table to any slide.

After you specify the number of columns and rows you want in the table, PowerPoint creates the table structure, which consists of a two-dimensional organization of rows and columns. The box at the intersection of each row and column is called a cell. Often the first row is used for column headings, and the leftmost column is used for row headings.

You work with PowerPoint tables in much the same way as you work with tables in Microsoft Office Word. (If the table you want to use already exists in a Word document, you can copy and paste that table into a PowerPoint slide, rather than re-creating it.)

To enter information in the table, you click a cell and then type. You can move the insertion point from cell to cell by pressing the Tab key. You can customize and format the entire table as well as individual cells by using buttons on the specialized Table Tools contextual tabs, which appear only when a table is active. For example, you can use buttons on the Design contextual tab to apply a table style that instantly formats the text and shades the cells to make key information stand out. You can use buttons on the Layout tab to combine, or merge, cells to create one cell that spans two or more columns or rows, and you can split a single cell into two or more cells.

In this exercise, you will create a table, enter text in its cells, apply a table style, insert a row, merge cells, and then format a row and individual cells.

1.	Display Slide 5, which has the Title And Content layout.
2.	In the content placeholder, click the Insert Table button. Insert Table The Insert Table dialog box opens.
3.	In the Number of columns box, type or select the number 3, and then in the Number of rows box, type or select the number 4.
4.	Click OK. A blank table with three columns and four rows appears. The heading row is shaded and the second and fourth rows are banded with a subtle shade of the same color. Because the table is active, the Table Tools contextual tabs appear on the Ribbon. [View full size image]
5.	In the upper-left cell of the table, type Task, press , type Time Spent per Day, press , type Time Saved per Week, and then press again. The insertion point moves to the first cell of the second row.
6.	Type Paper documents, press , type 15 minutes, press , type 6 hours, and then press again.
7.	Enter E-mail, 30 minutes, and 8 hours in the third row, and Calendar, 15 minutes, and 4 hours in the fourth row. [View full size image]
8.	On the Design contextual tab, in the Table Style Options group, clear the Banded Rows check box. The banding disappears. All rows except the header row are now the same color.
9.	In the Table Styles group, click the More button to display the Table Style gallery. More
10.	Point to various styles to see a live preview of their effects on the table, and then under Medium, click the third thumbnail in the first row (Medium Style 1 - Accent 2).
11.	In the Table Style Options group, select the First Column check box. The text in the first column becomes bold.
12.	Click anywhere in the header row, and then on the Layout tab, in the Rows & Columns group, click the Insert Above button. Tip You can insert a row below the row containing the insertion point or insert a column to the left or right by clicking the corresponding buttons. If you no longer need a column or row, you can remove it by clicking the Delete button and then clicking Delete Columns or Delete Rows.
13.	With the new row selected, in the Merge group, click the Merge Cells button. Tip Another way to merge cells is by clicking the Eraser button in the Draw Borders group on the Design contextual tab, and then dragging the eraser that appears across the border between two cells. To split a single cell into two, you can either select the cell and then click the Split Cells button in the Merge group on the Layout tab, or you can click the Draw Table button in the Draw Borders group on the Design tab, and then draw a cell border with the pencil that appears.
14.	In the merged cell, type Effect of Focused Activity, and then in the Alignment group, click the Center button. Center
15.	On the Design contextual tab, in the Table Styles group, click the Shading arrow, and then in the palette, click the dark blue box (Indigo, Accent 6) at the right end of the top Theme Colors row. Shading
16.	Select Time Spent per Day and Time Saved per Week, and in the center of the top Theme Colors row in the Shading palette, click the aqua box (Aqua, Accent 1). Then select Task, Paper documents, E-mail, and Calendar, and click the Shading button (not the arrow) to apply the most recently selected color (aqua) again.
17.	Press to select the entire table. Then in the Table Styles group, click the Borders arrow, and click Outside Borders. Borders
18.	Click a blank area of the slide to see the results.