Materials & extras
Downloads
Handouts, flashcards, and note cards from your instructor. Print any of them.
HandoutHandout 1: What to Bring — Spreadsheets for Everyday Use
Handout 1: What to Bring — Spreadsheets for Everyday Use
Okay sooo, before anyone panics about needing a fancy laptop or the newest version of anything, real talk: you need way less than you think. Here's the actual list, split into "you need this" and "nice if you have it."
Budget Tier (this is genuinely enough)
A laptop. Any laptop from the last several years works fine. Chromebooks are okay too. If you're not sure yours can run a spreadsheet program, bring it anyway and we'll check on day one.
A free account with Google Sheets or Microsoft Excel Online. Both are free. If you already have a Gmail address you already have Sheets. If you have a Microsoft/Outlook account you already have Excel Online. Set this up before class if you can, it saves us fifteen minutes we'd rather spend on actual sheet stuff.
A notebook and pen. Not gonna lie, I keep my own birthday and anniversary list on paper, so I'm not about to tell you paper's dumb. You'll want somewhere to jot down the "questions" we talk about in lesson one, before you ever open a blank sheet.
Your own real numbers, in your head or on a scrap of paper. Grocery spending, a hobby you sell stuff from, whatever. This class works best when you're building something you'll actually use afterward, not a fake example about fruit sales. Bring the thing you're actually trying to track.
Nice-to-Have Tier (not required, makes life easier)
A second monitor, or a tablet propped up next to your laptop. Handy for following along on screen while you work in your own file, but plenty of people just alt-tab back and forth and it's fine.
A USB mouse. If you hate trackpads like I do, formulas and cell-selecting are a lot less annoying with an actual mouse. Totally optional.
A folder (physical or digital) for your printouts. We'll do a couple of printed handouts through the course. If you're a keep-it-all-together person, grab a cheap folder. If you're a "photograph it and lose the paper in three days" person, also fine, no judgment, that's most of us.
Reading glasses if you use them. The default font size in most sheets is small. We'll bump it up together, but bring your glasses so you're not squinting on day one while I figure that out on the projector.
A note on where to get any of this
If you need to buy anything (a cheap mouse, a notebook), you don't need anything special. A basic office-supply aisle at any general store covers it, Costco if you already have a membership and want a multipack of notebooks you'll use for a decade. Nothing on this list needs to be nice. My own work laptop has a sticker half peeling off and a keyboard with a permanent faint apple-juice smell from a toddler incident I will not be elaborating on in a supply list.
What you do NOT need
You do not need a paid software subscription. You do not need a fast computer. You do not need to already know what a formula is. If you've opened a spreadsheet before and just typed numbers straight into the boxes, hand up, that's most people, and that's exactly the gap this class is built to close.
See you in class. Bring the laptop, bring your real numbers, and don't stress about the rest.
- C
HandoutHandout 2: Cheat Sheet — Spreadsheets for Everyday Use
Handout 2: Cheat Sheet — Spreadsheets for Everyday Use
Okay sooo, this is the "I forgot how to do the thing" page. Keep it by your computer, or fold it into the birthday notebook, whatever works. This is not everything, it's the stuff we actually use most weeks.
Before you type a single number
Ask your question first. "What am I trying to know" comes before "let me open a blank sheet." Blank sheets are scary because there's no question in them yet. If you can't finish the sentence "I want this sheet to tell me ___," stop and finish that sentence first.
The non-negotiable setting
Turn on autosave. File menu, or top of the screen depending which program you're in. Do this right now, before you forget. I lost twenty minutes of formulas to apple juice on a keyboard once and I have preached autosave ever since. Don't be a hero. You will lose.
Formulas, the ones that carry 90% of real life
=SUM(A1:A10)— adds up a range. Your best friend.=A1+B1(or minus, or times) — basic math between two cells.=AVERAGE(A1:A10)— self-explanatory, does the job.- Drag the little square at the bottom corner of a cell to copy a formula down a column instead of retyping it. If you're typing the same number in twice, you've already made a future mistake, you just haven't met it yet.
VLOOKUP— looks up a value and pulls back matching info from another column. It gets a bad rap for not being able to look "leftward," and technically that's not quite right, but real talk, it's annoying either way, so don't feel bad if you avoid it.
Sorting, without scrambling everything
Select your whole table before you sort, not just one column. If you sort one column alone, everything else stays put and your data turns into soup. My husband did this exact thing the first time I taught him and he still brings it up like it was my fault.
Formatting that actually earns its keep
- Conditional formatting — turns cells a color automatically when they hit a condition you set (a date coming due, a number over budget). This is the thing that got me noticed at my first real job. Genuinely useful, not just decoration.
- Bold headers, freeze the top row. So when you scroll down a long sheet you can still see what column you're in.
- Don't go overboard on colors. If every cell is a different shade you've built a puzzle, not a sheet.
Categories (budget people, this is for you)
Five or six categories is plenty. You do not need forty. Precision you won't maintain is worse than a rough number you'll actually keep using. "Food" can just be food.
Charts
One idea per chart. If you need a paragraph to explain what it's showing, it's not a chart anymore. Sometimes the chart just confirms something obvious, like "yep, we spend more in December." That's fine. That's the chart working.
Two honest gaps
Pivot tables I can build but can't always tell you WHY they did what they did. Printing a sheet so it fits nicely on one page, I've never once won that fight. I just look at things on screen and you can too.
- C
WorksheetHandout 3: Build Your Own Tracker
Handout 3: Build Your Own Tracker
okay sooo, this is the one where you actually leave with something. Not a demo file, not my example, YOUR sheet, built around a question you actually have. Fill this in as we go. Don't skip to building until you've got the top part answered, that's the part people skip and then wonder why the sheet feels pointless.
---
Step 1: What's the question?
Before you open a blank sheet, answer this. A blank sheet with no question in it is just scary. (Ask me how I know.)
The one thing I actually want to know is:
_______________________________________________
How I'll know if the sheet is working (what does the answer look like?):
_______________________________________________
Examples from class: "Am I spending more on groceries than I think?" "Which months are tight?" "Is this side project actually making money?"
---
Step 2: Categories (keep it to 5-6, I mean it)
You do not need forty categories. You need enough to see a pattern, and no more. "Food" can just be food.
Category Category Category 1. 4. 2. 5. 3. 6. (optional) If you wrote more than 6, cross two out right now. Go on, I'll wait.
---
Step 3: Columns you'll actually need
Most trackers need less than people think. Check the ones that apply to your question:
- [ ] Date
- [ ] Category (from Step 2)
- [ ] Amount
- [ ] Description / note
- [ ] Running total (formula, not retyped)
- [ ] Something else specific to you: _______________
---
Step 4: One formula you're adding today
Pick ONE. You can add more later, but today, one is plenty.
- [ ] SUM (add up a column)
- [ ] SUMIF (add up a column, but only rows matching a category)
- [ ] Simple running total (this row + row above)
- [ ] Other: _______________
Write the formula here before you type it into the sheet:
=_______________________________________________If it breaks, that's fine. That's actually the plan. Broken formulas on screen are how you learn what teh thing is doing.
---
Step 5: Autosave check
Stop. Go look at the top of your screen or the file menu right now.
- [ ] Autosave is ON.
I'm not asking, I'm telling. Do this before you type one more formula. I learned this lesson via a cup of apple juice and a keyboard and twenty minutes of lost work, you don't have to learn it that way too.
---
Step 6: The one-idea chart (optional today, do it if there's time)
If you're adding a chart, it should answer ONE question, not five. If you need a paragraph to explain your chart, it's not a chart, it's a puzzle.
My chart shows: _______________________________________________
The obvious, boring point it makes: _______________________________________________
If the point is boring and obvious, good. That's the chart working.
---
Before you leave
- [ ] I answered my real question in Step 1
- [ ] I have 5-6 categories, not 40
- [ ] Autosave is on
- [ ] I typed at least one formula that worked (or broke honestly, and I know why)
Take a picture of this page or take the paper home. Not everything has to live in the sheet, some of this is just for your brain. My birthday reminders live in a paper notebook and I do this for a living, so.
- C
HandoutHandout 4: Troubleshooting Guide — The Stuff That Always Goes Wrong
Handout 4: Troubleshooting Guide — The Stuff That Always Goes Wrong
Okay sooo, every class I've taught, these same 8-10 things come up. Every single time. So instead of us all discovering them separately, here they are up front. Print this, tape it near your desk, whatever works.
---
1. "My formula shows the formula, not the answer." You typed it into a cell that's formatted as Text instead of General/Number. Fix: change the cell format, then re-enter the formula. Just retyping it in the same cell won't work, you have to fix the format first.
2. "I typed a formula and got #REF! or #VALUE!" Something the formula points to got deleted, moved, or isn't a number. Click the cell, look at what it's actually referencing (the colored boxes when you double-click), and check that those cells still have what you expect. Nine times out of ten it's a fromula pointing at a column that got deleted.
3. "I sorted my table and now everything's scrambled." This is the classic. Casey did this to me the first time I taught him and he still brings it up like it's my fault. You sorted one column without selecting the whole table, so the row relationships broke. Undo immediately (Ctrl+Z / Cmd+Z) before you do anything else. Going forward: select your whole table, or better, use "format as table" first so sorting knows to grab everything together.
4. "I lost 20 minutes of work." Turn on autosave. I mean it. I learned this lesson because a toddler dumped apple juice on my keyboard mid-formula and autosave was off, and I lost real work. Google Sheets autosaves by default. In Excel, save to OneDrive and turn AutoSave on at the top. Do this today, not after it happens to you.
5. "My chart looks like a plate of spaghetti." You're trying to show too many things at once. A chart should make one point obvious, not require a paragraph of explanation. Pick the one comparison you actually care about and chart just that. Everything else can wait for a second chart.
6. "Copying a formula gave me wrong numbers in other rows." Usually a missing dollar sign. If you want a formula to always point at the same cell no matter where you copy it (like a tax rate in one spot), you need $ in front of the column and row, like $B$2. Without it, the reference "slides" as you copy, which is usually what you want, except when it isn't.
7. "I have the same number typed in five places and now it's wrong in three of them." This is the retyping trap. If you're ever typing the same value twice, that's a future mistake waiting to happen, you just haven't met it yet. Put the number in one cell and reference it everywhere else with a formula.
8. "My budget has 40 categories and I gave up in February." Not a formula problem, a design problem, but I see it constantly. Five or six categories is plenty. "Food" can just be food. A rough number you'll actually keep beats a precise one you'll abandon.
9. "VLOOKUP won't find something that's clearly there." Check for extra spaces or mismatched formatting (a number stored as text won't match a real number). Also, VLOOKUP only looks to the right of your search column by default. Somebody argued with me once that it can't look left at all, that part's not quite true, but real talk, it's annoying enough that I usually just rearrange my columns instead of fighting it.
10. "It worked yesterday and now it's just... broken." Check if a row or column got deleted or inserted somewhere upstream. This shifts everything and breaks references in ways that aren't obvious right away. Ctrl+Z as far back as you can stand, then rebuild carefully from there.
---
When in doubt: undo first, panic never. Most of this stuff is fixable in under a minute once you know what you're looking at.
- C
podcast_scriptClass podcast — episode 1
Audio coming soon — show notes below.
JESS: —and I told her, I said that's not a spreadsheet problem, that's a "you built forty categories" problem.
CASSANDRA: Which, okay, that's real. That's an actual conversation I've had with an actual person.
JESS: This is Jess, I produce the podcasts for Utah Community Learning, and I'm sitting here with Cassandra Draper, who's teaching Spreadsheets for Everyday Use starting this week. Cassandra, say hi.
CASSANDRA: Hi. Real talk, I did not think anyone would want a podcast about this but here we are.
JESS: People love it. Okay so, session one already happened for some of you listening late, but for anyone deciding whether to sign up for the next round, I want to know, who shows up to a spreadsheet class.
CASSANDRA: Honestly a lot of different people. I always start by asking who's opened a sheet and just typed numbers straight into the boxes, no formulas, nothing. And like two-thirds of the room raises their hand every single time.
JESS: Is that bad?
CASSANDRA: It's not bad, it's just, that's the gap. That's where I aim the whole class. Because here's the thing, most people don't actually have a spreadsheet problem. They have a question problem. They open a blank sheet and it's scary because there's no question in it yet. Nothing to build toward.
JESS: Say more about that.
CASSANDRA: So instead of "I should make a budget," which is nothing, it's a blank wall, you ask "how much did I spend on groceries in December." That's a real question. Now the sheet has a job.
JESS: Okay I want an example people can actually use, something a listener could do tonight without taking the class.
CASSANDRA: Sure. Turn on autosave. Whatever program you're in, go find it, turn it on, right now, pause the podcast if you have to.
JESS: That's it? That's the tip?
CASSANDRA: That's the tip. I learned this one the hard way. My son Dawson, he was three at the time, dumped apple juice on my keyboard mid-formula and I lost like twenty minutes of work because autosave was off. I wasn't even mad at him, he's three, juice happens. I was mad at myself for betting against a toddler and losing.
JESS: You were betting against a toddler.
CASSANDRA: I was betting against a toddler and I lost, and I turn autosave on for people now like it's a public service announcement. Manual saving is you being a hero for no reason. Nobody's giving you a medal.
JESS: Okay I love that. What else came up in session one that you didn't plan for?
CASSANDRA: Oh man, someone asked about tracking a side business, like little Etsy thing, and I basically rebuilt the whole live example around that on the spot instead of my usual grocery one. Which, that's kind of how I like to teach anyway. If I know what you actually care about I'll aim the lesson at that instead of some generic thing nobody needs.
JESS: You do that a lot, don't you, remember what people said and build around it.
CASSANDRA: I try to. It's not some technique, I just think if you tell me you want to track your side business and then I show you a chart about my grocery spending, that's a waste of your night.
JESS: Fair. Okay, before we wrap, give me something a little more, I don't know, human. Not a tip, just a story.
CASSANDRA: Okay so, not gonna lie, this one's a little embarrassing. My birthday and anniversary tracker, it's not even a spreadsheet, it's paper. A little notebook, one page per month. And the March page has this coffee ring on it from years ago, before I had kids, and I have never once redone that page.
JESS: Why not, you could just recopy it.
CASSANDRA: I could. But that's just what March looks like now. It's got a coffee ring on it. I don't know, I think there's something in there about not everything needing to be perfect or redone or optimized. Some pages just have a ring on them and that's fine.
JESS: That's very on brand for someone who tells everybody a rough number you'll actually keep beats a precise one you'll abandon in three weeks.
CASSANDRA: Yeah, same idea. The notebook's allowed to be messy. That's the sheet working, in a weird way, even though it's not a sheet.
JESS: Okay, last thing, what's coming up next session so people know what they're walking into.
CASSANDRA: Next time we're doing formulas that actually save you from yourself, so basically, if you're the type who types the same number into three different cells, we fix that. And I'm bringing in a broken one on purpose. I'll leave a formula pointing at the wrong thing on the screen and we figure out together why it's wrong before I fix it.
JESS: On purpose.
CASSANDRA: On purpose. It's more useful watching something break than watching me do it clean the whole time.
JESS: All right, that's session two, formulas and one broken sheet, on purpose. Cassandra, thanks for doing this.
CASSANDRA: Thanks for having me. Go turn on autosave.
podcast_scriptClass podcast — episode 2
Audio coming soon — show notes below.
JESS: —wait, say that part again, because I don't think I've ever thought about a spreadsheet that way.
CASSANDRA: Which part.
JESS: The "question problem" thing.
CASSANDRA: Oh yeah. Okay so, here's the thing. Most people think they have a spreadsheet problem. Like, "I don't know Excel," "I'm bad at formulas." But really what's happening is they open a blank sheet and they don't know what they're trying to find out yet. That's why it's scary. It's not the tool, it's that there's no question in it.
JESS: So what's the fix.
CASSANDRA: You ask the question first, out loud, before you touch the keyboard. Like "I want to know if I'm spending more on groceries in December than the rest of the year." That's a question. Now you know what columns you need. Blank sheet's just scary because it's got no job yet.
JESS: Okay that's basically what happened with the nap tracker, right? Tell that one, people loved that one last time I mentioned it.
CASSANDRA: Oh man, yes. Okay so when Alex was a baby, I was convinced there was a pattern in his naps. Like if I just tracked start time, end time, how fussy he was going down, some kind of schedule would reveal itself and I could plan my whole day around it.
JESS: Very on brand for you.
CASSANDRA: Extremely on brand. So I built this whole tracker. Color coded and everything. Weeks of data.
JESS: And?
CASSANDRA: Nothing. No pattern. None. Babies do not respect spreadsheets, Jess. They do not care about your columns.
JESS: 😂
CASSANDRA: I still have the sheet. I keep it as, like, a monument. A little reminder that sometimes you build the thing and the answer is "there is no answer, this is just chaos, stop looking for structure that isn't there."
JESS: That's a very expensive lesson for one baby to teach you.
CASSANDRA: Free labor, that kid. Anyway. That's actually a fine outcome, not gonna lie. That's the sheet working, even when it tells you "nope."
JESS: Okay give people something they can use today, though. Something they don't need the class for.
CASSANDRA: Turn on autosave. Right now. Today. Whatever you're using, Sheets, Excel, whatever, go find the autosave setting and turn it on.
JESS: Is this the apple juice story.
CASSANDRA: It's the apple juice story. Dawson was three, I was mid-formula, he dumped his cup right on the keyboard, and I lost like twenty minutes of work because autosave was off. I was doing it the old way, hitting save every so often like a hero.
JESS: You were not a hero.
CASSANDRA: I was not a hero, I was a person who was about to lose a Saturday. Turned it on that day. Never looked back. It costs you nothing and it saves you from betting against toddlers, spilled drinks, power blips, whatever. You will lose that bet eventually. Just take the bet off the table.
JESS: Love it. Okay, quick, what's next session, because people are asking me in the parking lot now, which, I don't know if that's a compliment to you or a complaint about me.
CASSANDRA: 😂 Probably both. Next time we're doing formulas, but real ones, not the scary kind. Just, if you're typing the same number into ten cells, we're gonna fix that, because that's ten future mistakes waiting to happen. You just haven't met them yet.
JESS: Ominous.
CASSANDRA: A little. Bring a laptop if you've got one, and honestly bring a real problem you've got. Doesn't have to be fancy. Grocery spending, a side hustle, whatever you're already keeping track of badly on paper or in your head.
JESS: Because she will build the example around your actual life, listeners, this is not a bit.
CASSANDRA: It's not a bit. I did it for someone's soap business last session, I'll do it for your thing too.
JESS: Alright. See everybody Thursday.
CASSANDRA: See you Thursday. Bring snacks, we take a real break halfway through, I don't do marathon sessions, that's not how my brain works.
podcast_scriptClass podcast — episode 3
Audio coming soon — show notes below.
JESS: —and I'm pretty sure that's the third person who's asked you to fix their sign-up sheet this month.
CASSANDRA: It's a problem. Not gonna lie, I can't say no to a messy sheet. It's like seeing a crooked picture frame.
JESS: Okay so for people just joining us, this is episode three of Spreadsheets for Everyday Use, and last session was categories and budgets, right?
CASSANDRA: Yeah, categories and why you don't need forty of them. Five or six is plenty. Food can just be food.
JESS: That is apparently controversial. I got a comment about that.
CASSANDRA: 😂 I know. People want to build the perfect system on day one and then abandon it by week three because it's too much upkeep. A rough number you'll actually keep beats a precise one you quit on. That's the whole opinion.
JESS: Okay real talk, tell the story you told me before we started recording. The Relief Society one.
CASSANDRA: Oh man, okay. So this was a while back, an activity at church, and I offered to make a sign-up sheet. Just a simple one, who's bringing what.
JESS: Simple.
CASSANDRA: That's what I said too. And within like twenty minutes I've got tabs. I've got a tab for supplies, a tab for who's driving, conditional formatting so if a slot's full it turns gray. I cannot help myself, it just happens.
JESS: And then?
CASSANDRA: And then three different women came up to me before the night was even over asking if I could make one for their thing. One was a carpool schedule, one was a fundraiser, I don't even remember the third. I just remember thinking, I did not sign up to become the spreadsheet lady of this ward, and also, yeah, I kind of am now.
JESS: It's a good problem to have though.
CASSANDRA: It is. It's also exhausting, ha. But here's the thing, that sheet worked because it answered an actual question people had, which was "what's still needed and who's bringing it." That's it. That's the whole design goal. People overthink this part.
JESS: Okay so let's give listeners something they can use today, even if they never take the class.
CASSANDRA: Yes. Okay. Turn on autosave. Just go do it right now if you haven't.
JESS: This is the apple juice story, isn't it.
CASSANDRA: It's the apple juice story. Dawson was three, I was mid-formula on the household budget, and he dumped his cup right on the keyboard. I lost twenty minutes of work because autosave was off and I hadn't saved in a while.
JESS: Twenty minutes doesn't sound like much.
CASSANDRA: It doesn't, until you're staring at a blank formula bar trying to remember exactly what you typed and why. I turned autosave on that same day and I have preached it to literally everyone since. In Google Sheets it's just on by default, which I love. In Excel you've got to dig for it a little, there's a toggle up top when you're saved to OneDrive. Either way, go check. Don't be a hero about saving, you will lose eventually, either to a toddler or your own forgetfulness, and it's the same result.
JESS: 🙌 Okay, autosave. Everyone go check right now, we'll wait.
CASSANDRA: 😂 I mean, keep listening, but yeah.
JESS: So what's coming up next session? People want to know if they should bring anything.
CASSANDRA: Bring a real question you have. That's genuinely the assignment. Next time we're doing charts, and my whole thing with charts is one idea per chart, not five. If you need a paragraph to explain what your chart is showing, it's not a chart anymore, it's a puzzle, and nobody wants to solve a puzzle to find out you spent too much in December.
JESS: Wait, is that a real example.
CASSANDRA: It is a real example. I spent an entire Saturday building this beautiful chart of our grocery spending by month, colors, labels, the whole thing, so proud of it. Showed Casey. He looked at it for about four seconds and said "okay so we spend a lot in December."
JESS: That's it?
CASSANDRA: That's it. And I said yes. That's the chart working. It wasn't supposed to be a revelation, it was supposed to be obvious at a glance, and it was. Boring is the goal with charts. If it's dramatic you probably built it wrong.
JESS: I love that you were disappointed the chart worked.
CASSANDRA: For like a second, yeah. Then I got over it.
JESS: Okay, bring a real question, next time is charts, one idea each, keep it boring.
CASSANDRA: That's the tagline. Keep it boring on purpose.
JESS: Alright, we'll catch everyone at the next session. Cassandra, thanks.
CASSANDRA: Thanks Jess. Go turn on autosave.
FlashcardsPrintable flashcards — Spreadsheets for Everyday Use
Print it, fold it, stick it on the fridge.
Spreadsheets for Everyday Use — Flashcards
Cut along the lines. Fold or box-store these however you want — I'm not precious about it. Print double-sided if your printer's feeling brave, single-sided if it's not.
FRONT BACK Why not just type numbers into boxes? You can! But a spreadsheet does the math for you, and updates it when the numbers change. That's the whole pitch. Excel or Google Sheets — does it matter which? Not really. Same ideas, different buttons. I use both and still hit the wrong shortcut in each one, so don't feel bad. First thing to do before anything else Turn on autosave. Right now. Close this card, go do it, come back. The question to write down before you build anything "What question is this sheet answering?" If you can't answer that in one sentence, you're not ready to start typing. Row A horizontal line, numbered down the side. Think of it as one "record" — one week, one person, one purchase. Column A vertical line, lettered across the top. Usually one category of thing — dates, amounts, names. Cell Where a row and column cross. Has an address, like B4. That address is how formulas talk to each other. Fixing a mistyped entry Click the cell, retype it, hit enter. That's it. You are allowed to just fix things directly — no ceremony required. The fill handle That tiny square at the bottom-right corner of a selected cell. Drag it to copy a value or pattern down a column instead of retyping. Making a sheet readable Bold your headers, add light borders between sections. That's genuinely most of what you need — resist the urge to color every cell a different shade. SUM Adds up a range of cells. =SUM(B2:B10)adds everything from B2 down to B10. Your first real formula, and a good one.The four basic math symbols in a formula +add,-subtract,*multiply,/divide. Point at cells instead of typing numbers when you can —=B2+B3, not=12+15.AVERAGE, MIN, MAX AVERAGE tells you the typical number. MIN and MAX show you the edges — cheapest week, most expensive week. Useful when a total alone doesn't tell the story. "This formula is broken on purpose" — why do that in class So you see what broken actually looks like before it happens to you at home, quietly, at 11pm, with no instructor around. Copying a formula down without breaking it Cell references shift automatically when you drag them down — that's usually what you want. If you don't want it to shift, that's what a dollar sign ( $B$2) is for.How many budget categories to start with Five. Housing, food, transportation, everything-else, and savings. You can split them later. Five is enough to see the shape of your money. The number that actually matters in a budget Income minus spending. Everything else is detail. If that number's negative, that's the thing to look at first, not the fifth decimal of your grocery total. Conditional formatting A rule that changes a cell's color based on its value — like turning a number orange when it's over budget. The sheet flags the problem so you don't have to hunt for it. Keeping a budget going without hating it Pick one day a week, five minutes, same time. Consistency beats intensity. A sheet you update for ten minutes every Sunday beats one you rebuild from scratch every three months. What's worth tracking in a sheet vs. on paper Numbers that change and need adding up — spreadsheet. Dates you just need to remember, like birthdays — honestly, paper's fine. I do both. Setting up columns for dates and entries Put dates in their own column, formatted as dates (not text), so you can sort and filter by them later. Future-you will thank present-you. Sorting without scrambling everything Select the whole table, not just one column, before you sort. Otherwise you'll shuffle names away from their own numbers, and that's a bad afternoon. Filtering Temporarily hides rows that don't match what you're looking for — like "just March" or "just groceries." Nothing gets deleted, it's just tucked out of view. Making your first chart Select your data, insert a chart, see what it defaults to. You will immediately want to change something about it. That's normal — that's the process. Bar vs. line vs. pie — how to choose Bar: comparing separate things. Line: something changing over time. Pie: parts of a whole, and only if there are just a few parts. When in doubt, bar chart. Cleaning up a chart Kill the legend if there's only one series, remove gridlines you don't need, put a plain title on it that says what it's showing. Less on the chart, not more. Keeping your sheets alive after class Open the one you built here again next week, even for two minutes. A sheet you abandon isn't a system — it's just a document you made once. ---
One aside before you go: none of this needs to look impressive. My household budget still has a tab called "misc" that's been "temporary" for two years. It works. That's the whole bar.
Memory helpsMnemonics & memory helps
Print it, fold it, stick it on the fridge.
Mnemonics & Memory Helps ## Spreadsheets for Everyday Use
I made these on my kitchen table, most of them while waiting for a pot of water to boil. They're corny. Corny is fine. Corny is what sticks.
Print this page. Fold it in half. Keep it near your keyboard for the first few weeks — after that you won't need it.
---
1. "A Cell Named Its Street Address" — for Rows, Columns, Cells
The line: Every cell has an address, just like your house. The column is the street, the row is the house number.
What it unpacks: People freeze up on "B4" like it's code. It's not code, it's directions. Column B, row 4 — that's it, that's the whole system. If you can tell someone how to find your porch, you can find a cell.
---
2. "Save Like You Mean It, Before You Even Start" — for Autosave
The line: Turn the key before you drive the car.
What it unpacks: This one's not clever, it's just true. Autosave is not a nice-to-have you add later. It's the seatbelt. You put it on before you go anywhere, not after the swerve. If you remember nothing else from week one, remember this one.
---
3. "What Am I Actually Asking?" — for defining your sheet's question first
The line: No question, no sheet. Write the question first, in real words, at the top.
What it unpacks: The single biggest mistake I see is people opening a blank sheet and just... typing. A sheet without a question is a junk drawer. "How much am I spending on groceries" is a question. Write it in cell A1 if you have to. Everything else follows from that sentence.
---
4. "Type It, Trust It, Then Check It" — for entering and fixing data
The line: Type first, panic never. Undo is right there — Ctrl+Z, or Cmd+Z, is your best friend and always has been.
What it unpacks: New spreadsheet users type like they're defusing a bomb. You're not. You will mistype things constantly, forever, no matter how good you get. The skill isn't perfect typing. The skill is calm fixing. Undo exists so you don't have to be careful, you just have to be willing to hit one key twice.
---
5. "Grab the Corner, Drag, Done" — for the fill handle
The line: See the little square in the corner? Grab it like a suitcase handle and pull.
What it unpacks: The fill handle is the one shortcut that makes people say "oh, THAT'S what this is for" out loud in my class, every single time. It's the little square at the bottom-right of a selected cell. Drag it down a column and it repeats your pattern — dates, numbers, formulas, all of it. Ninety seconds of practice and you'll never type twelve months by hand again.
---
6. "SUM Is a Suitcase, Not a Suggestion" — for your first SUM formula
The line: SUM packs everything you point at into one number.
What it unpacks:
=SUM(then you select the range, then close the parenthesis — that's the whole spell. I call it a suitcase because it doesn't care what's in the range, it just zips it all together into one total. Once SUM feels normal, every other formula gets easier, because they all work roughly the same way: name the formula, point at your data, close it up.---
7. "PEMDAS Never Left You, It Just Got a Job" — for basic math operators and cell references
The line: Same math you learned in fourth grade. Plus, minus, times, divide. The only new part is pointing instead of writing the number.
What it unpacks: People get intimidated by formulas because they look like a foreign language. They're not.
=A2*B2is just "multiply this by that," except instead of writing the actual numbers, you're pointing at where the numbers live. If those numbers change later, your formula updates itself. That's the entire magic trick.---
8. "Middle Child Gets AVERAGE" — for AVERAGE, MIN, MAX
The line: AVERAGE is the middle child, MIN is the smallest kid in the photo, MAX is the one standing on a chair.
What it unpacks: Silly, but it works: AVERAGE tells you the typical value, MIN finds the smallest number in your range, MAX finds the biggest. Think of your family photo — someone's average height, someone's the shortest, someone's climbing on furniture to look taller. Same idea, just numbers instead of nephews.
---
9. "The Ladder Only Works If Every Rung Matches" — for copying formulas down a column without breaking them
The line: A formula copied down is a ladder. Every rung has to be built the same way, or somebody falls through.
What it unpacks: This is where most home-brewed spreadsheets quietly break. You copy a formula down 40 rows, but one reference was supposed to stay fixed (like a tax rate in one cell) and instead it slid down with everything else. That's your dollar-sign moment —
$B$2locks a cell in place so it doesn't drift when you drag. I'll show you exactly when you need it, but the ladder image is the thing to remember: consistency, all the way down.---
10. "Five Buckets, Not Fifty" — for setting up income and spending categories
The line: You don't need fifty buckets. You need five, and you need to actually use them.
What it unpacks: People overbuild their first budget sheet — twenty categories, half of them empty by March. Housing, food, transportation, fun, everything else. Five is plenty to start. A category nobody updates isn't tracking anything, it's just a tombstone.
---
11. "Orange Means Look Here, Not Panic" — for conditional formatting
The line: Orange isn't an alarm. Orange is your sheet tapping you on the shoulder.
What it unpacks: This came straight from my very first work project — contract dates turning orange when they were coming due. Conditional formatting does the noticing for you, so you're not scanning three hundred rows hoping to catch the one that matters. Set the rule once, and the color does the work forever after.
---
12. "Sort the Deck, Don't Shuffle It" — for sorting without scrambling your table
The line: You're sorting a hand of cards, not throwing the deck in the air.
What it unpacks: The number one sorting disaster is selecting one column and sorting it, while the rest of the row stays put — now your name doesn't match your number anymore. Select the whole table first. Sort a hand of cards and every card stays whole; throw the deck up and you've got chaos on the floor.
---
13. "Filter Is a Window, Not a Shredder" — for filtering
The line: Filtering hides rows. It does not delete them. Nothing is gone, the blinds are just half-shut.
What it unpacks: New users get nervous about filtering because rows disappear and it feels destructive. It isn't. Your data's all still there — you've just closed the blinds on the rows you don't need to see right now. Clear the filter, everything's back.
---
14. "Bar Stands, Line Moves, Pie Shares" — for choosing a chart type
The line: Bar stands things up next to each other. Line shows something moving through time. Pie shows how a whole thing got split up.
What it unpacks: This is the fastest way I know to stop the "which chart do I even pick" freeze. Comparing categories side by side? Bar. Watching something change over weeks or months? Line. Showing how one total breaks into parts? Pie — and use it sparingly, because pie charts get messy past about five slices.
---
One more, for the road
"If you wouldn't hand it to your mother, keep cleaning it up."
For the whole unit on making a sheet readable — borders, bold, chart labels, all of it. Not because your mother's the toughest critic in the world. Because it's a good gut check for "would a person who didn't build this understand it in ten seconds." If yes, you're done. Stop fiddling with fonts.
---
Keep this sheet. Tape it inside a cabinet, tuck it in the notebook where you keep your budget — wherever you'll actually see it again. You don't need to memorize spreadsheets. You just need enough hooks to catch the pieces before they slide off.
Cheat sheetOne-page note card — Spreadsheets for Everyday Use
Print it, fold it, stick it on the fridge.
Spreadsheets for Everyday Use ## Fridge Note Card — Keep This Where You'll See It
---
Before anything else: turn on autosave. Both Excel (OneDrive/AutoSave toggle, top left) and Google Sheets (does it automatically) — check it now, not after you've lost something.
Ask the question first. Before you build anything, write down the actual question you want answered. "Where is my money going" is a question. A pile of numbers is not.
Concept What It Means Cell One box. Named by column + row, like B4.Row / Column Rows go across (numbered), columns go up-down (lettered). Fill handle Little square, bottom-right of a cell. Drag it to copy or continue a pattern. `SUM` =SUM(B2:B10)adds everything in that range.`AVERAGE`, `MIN`, `MAX` Same idea — swap the word, keep the range. Useful when you want "typical," "lowest," or "highest," not just "total." Basic math + - * /— point at cells instead of typing numbers when you can.=B2-B3, not=45-12.Copying formulas down Use the fill handle. Cell references shift automatically (that's the whole point). If it breaks, check for a $lock (absolute reference) you didn't mean to have — or didn't have and needed.On formatting: borders and bold, used sparingly, make a sheet readable. That's most of what you need. Resist the urge to decorate.
Budget structure that actually works:
Category Example Income 1 line, sometimes 2 Fixed spending Rent, insurance Variable spending Groceries, gas Savings Even if it's small Everything else The junk drawer category — every budget needs one Five categories is plenty. Income minus spending is the one number you actually came here for.
Conditional formatting turns the scary numbers orange (or red) automatically, so you don't have to go looking for trouble — it finds you.
Sorting rearranges rows by a column you pick — select your whole table first, or you'll scramble it.
Filtering hides rows temporarily so you can see just what matters right now. Nothing gets deleted.
Charts, quick guide:
Chart Use For Bar Comparing categories Line Change over time Pie Parts of one whole (use rarely — five slices, max) Clean up a chart by deleting anything that doesn't help someone understand it in three seconds. Titles matter. Gridlines usually don't.
Keeping it alive after class: update it weekly, same day each time if you can. A sheet you update for ten minutes every Sunday beats a perfect sheet you built once and never opened again.
---
You don't need to be fast at this. You need it to answer your question. That's the whole job.
Around the web
Sites we keep coming back to. Some picked by your instructor, some shared in class.
- Microsoft Excel (Wikipedia) ↗
A good overview of the history and features of the spreadsheet program most of you will end up using.
- Spreadsheet (Wikipedia) ↗
This explains the basic concept behind all spreadsheet software, useful if you want the big picture before diving into specific tools.
- Google Sheets (Wikipedia) ↗
A quick read on the free, browser-based alternative to Excel that we will also touch on in class.
- Microsoft Excel Support ↗
The official help center for Excel, where you can search for step by step instructions on almost any feature.
- Exceljet ↗
A clean, no-nonsense site full of short tutorials and formula examples that I refer back to often myself.
- Contextures ↗
Run by a longtime Excel MVP, this site has clear tutorials on formulas, pivot tables, and everyday spreadsheet tasks.
- Chandoo.org ↗
A well known Excel blog with practical tips and templates that go a bit beyond the basics once you are ready.
Videos worth your time
Hand-picked by your instructor, with notes on what to watch for.
- Microsoft Excel Tutorial for Beginners - Full CoursefreeCodeCamp.org
This full beginner course walks through the Excel interface first, so pay close attention to how rows, columns, and cells are labeled before moving to formulas.
- Google Sheets for Beginners - The Complete CourseTechnology for Teachers and Students
Watch how this complete Google Sheets course explains basic formulas and formatting, since those same skills carry over directly into Excel.
- Excel for Beginners - The Complete CourseTechnology for Teachers and Students
Notice how this complete Excel course builds up from simple data entry to basic functions, which is the exact order we will follow in class.
Practice corner
6 quizzes and 2 games. Playable by anyone, no account needed.
Open the practice corner →