Concept of the Workbook / Worksheet Relationship
Imagine you are a professor (you may not have to imagine at all...) and that you teach two different classes: ENG 101 and ENG 202. The classes are large, and are split into two sections each, 101 A and B, and 202 A and B. You have two separate grade books for each class (101 and 202). Each gradebook has two pages in it, one for Section A and one for Section B. Each page is filled with students' grades. Each one of your sections fits on one page, and each page represents a separate section. Sections A and B in ENG 101 are probably quite different from one another, but as a whole, they make up your entire gradebook for ENG 101. The same can be said of ENG 202.
Ironically, this is exactly how an Excel Workbook functions! Each spreadsheet on the screen is called a WORKSHEET, and, to follow the example, each worksheet represents a section's grades. You have two classes (101 and 202) and so you have two Workbooks. You also have two Sections (A and B) in each class and so you have two Worksheets in each Workbook. These worksheets are separate entities within themselves (just like the sections), but they also exist as part of a larger whole: your gradebook, or in Excel terms, your WORKBOOK.
So, to relate back to how you were using spreadsheets in older versions of Excel, the standard spreadsheet remains the same; it is just now called a Worksheet. Excel simply extends the Worksheet idea by combining many worksheets together into a larger, encompassing Workbook. At most times you will usually create new workbooks for each new topic you work on, and will usually only use the first Worksheet, so everything will be the same as before. However, if you have similar topics that you may want to do calculations on as a whole (i.e. take an average of both sections A and B of ENG 101) it would be suitable to put each topic on its own Worksheet in the same Workbook.
Workbook Navigation
There are just a few new features to learn about navigating through your Workbook.
- There are the three tabs (by default; you can change this number) at the bottom left of the document window, labeled "Sheet 1", "Sheet 2", and "Sheet 3". These are the "handles" by which you switch Worksheets (i.e. turn the pages of your Workbook). Each represents a different Worksheet -- if you add a Worksheet, another tab will appear. (Note: you can name your tabs more appropriate names by double-clicking on the label, and typing in the desired new name.)
- There are four little buttons to the left of the Worksheet Tabs that look like audio/video equipment controls -- they are your Workbook Navigation controls.
PLEASE NOTE: these buttons do not do ANYTHING unless your Worksheet window is too small to fit the number of tabs at the bottom of the window. In most cases, your window will be wide enough to handle the default three Worksheets, and so you should simply navigate by clicking on the tabs. If, however, you do have more Worksheets than the number of Tabs you can see, the buttons do the following:
The two outside buttons advance to the absolute first or last Worksheet
The two inside buttons advance forward or backward by one Worksheet
Add new worksheets by going to the INSERT menu and using the WORKSHEET command. Delete existing worksheets by right-clicking (for Windows users) or CONTROL+clicking (for Macs) on the tab for the worsheet marked for destruction, then selecting DELETE in the menu that appears (a confirmation screen appears in case you change your mind). You can rearrange the order in which the tabs appear by dragging each one's position relative to the others.
Written by Matthew Dull '01; Updated for 2004 by Jordan McDonnell '08