Formatting in Word
Formatting the text in Word is important because it allows you to assign different attributes to different sections of your document. There are two ways to format text: Direct Formatting or Styles.
With Direct Formatting, you select each section of the text separately, and specify the attributes. So, if you want all the headings in your document to be Arial, 20 points, Bold, you will have to select every heading and assign these attributes for each heading. Now imagine that you are working on a 20-page document that has ten headings, 30 subheadings, bullets, sub-bullets….
In such a situation, its better to format the text with styles. Styles define the appearance of text elements in your document, such as headings, captions, and body text. The primary advantage of using styles is that every time you use a Style, the same formatting is assigned to that paragraph. So if you have headings throughout your document, you define the Style one time and assign to each heading and all the headings the same format. Styles make formatting your document faster and easier. They also serve as building blocks for tables of contents.
Applying a style to text
1. To apply a particular style to a segment of text, first select or highlight the text you want to change.
2. Select the style you want to apply from the Style drop-down list.
Modifying an existing style
- Click Format > Style on the menu bar.
- Highlight the style you want to change in the Styles list, and click Modify.
- Click Format and select the aspect of the style you wish to change.
- 4.Select a new formatting.
- Click OK.
- Click OK again
