Wednesday, November 4, 2015

Time to Write: #2 Format & Page Numbers


I have turned my pen from research to writing. I am gathering every scrap of information about my mother’s family and writing a book for my family. I used my index cards to layout the book and wrote an outline to fine tune the direction the writing will take.

I know that I will be taking this book to a local publisher, Troy Book Makers, who published my book, ‘The Mark Family Story’. Therefore, I know I want to use Microsoft Word 2010.


As I started to put together the chapters the first thing I wanted to add was page numbers. They are not at all difficult to add to a Word document. Click on Insert/Page Number and an assortment of options drop down. The page numbers can be located on the top or bottom of a page or in the margins. It is also possible to go to Insert/Footer or Insert/Header to select a style for page numbers.

When I wrote ‘The Mark Family Story’ I used the ‘Conservative’ Footer. At the bottom center of each page is a thin line with the title of the book & the page number. This time I went to Insert/Page Numbers and selected Accent Bar 2. I chose this option because I would like to have, on the bottom of each page, both the page number & the title of my book.

adding the page numbers took very little time. However, I do not want page numbers on the early pages: Title Page, Publisher Information Page, Dedication Page and the Table of Contents. I want the Introduction [which follows my Table of Contents] to be Page #1. Last time my daughter helped me to set that up. Now she lives several states away.

I used a couple different things to show me how to do this. First, I went to the “?” [help] in the corner of my document and looked for help with page numbers. I did not find that useful. Then I looked on line for help. However, the best assistance I found was on you tube:  'Insert Sections with Different Page Numbers'.

Basically, I went to the end of the first section and put in a Section Break. Then I made sure the sections were not linked. The page numbers begin with the second section. The video explains it more clearly than I could here. If you want help, I suggest you watch it.

Hurray! The page numbers are where I want them.



1 comment:

  1. Oh, how many times did I have to help students with page numbering and section breaks, linking or not linking?! UGH -- glad I don't have to do that anymore.

    ReplyDelete

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