Excel Tutorial – BIO 204
(Office 2007 Version)
Additional background in Knisely:
1st Edition pp.145-165
2nd Edition pp. 175-205
Assignment due in lab
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Excel
• Excel is a Microsoft spreadsheet program found in standard MSOffice software packages. Spreadsheets are useful for entering,
organizing, graphing, and analyzing data and will be used
throughout this course and others in the Biology Department.
• Excel will be used in Bio 204 to organize and graph data to help
you draw conclusions about major trends in data in several lab
exercises.
• There will be a practical question on the final lab exam
requiring you to build a graph from data using Excel. You will
have ample opportunity to practice using this program. Be sure
to do so: don’t let your lab partners do all the work!
• This tutorial assumes you have some basic computer knowledge
and vocabulary. If you are unfamiliar with the terminology or
specific skills please see your TA or ATUS for help.
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Excel
• NOTE: The following instructions and all spreadsheets used in
Bio 204 will use the Microsoft® Office 2007 version of Excel.
If you use a Mac, you are on your own, as this version is
somewhat different. If in doubt as to which version you have,
after opening Excel, choose Help > About Microsoft Excel to
see which version you have). See your TA or ATUS for help
with your version.
• The more you use Excel, the more you will learn. So...
Play around with it. Explore different menu options, right
mouse clicks, and different tabs. Explore and enjoy, some
of the stuff is pretty cool.
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After completing this tutorial
you should...
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Be familiar with standard functions and general layout of Excel.
Be able to enter data in a workbook.
Be able to use formulas to do simple calculations in Excel.
Be able to plot data using Chart Wizard.
Understand what properly formatted figures & tables look like
and know how to format your own figures & tables.
• Be able to draw simple conclusions about the main trends in
data presented in a figure.
• Marvel at the opportunities that Excel will bring to your life!
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Getting through the tutorial
• Keep this tutorial open in one Window and Open Excel in
another (see next page).
• As you work through the tutorial you will be instructed to
perform certain tasks in Excel.
• Go through the tutorial step-by-step and do each activity in the
order described here.
• If you get caught up at any one step you may find it useful to
open up the Help menu in Excel and search for help on that
activity.
– Alternatively, if you’re really stuck or want some extra help here are some ideas:
• Attend a free workshop offered by ATUS
(https://west.wwu.edu/training/)
• Go to your TA’s office hours.
• Ask your roommate.
• You will be required to turn in your datasheet as you entered it in
Excel, your final figure and a table, and a response to the final
question at the end of the tutorial.
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• To start:
– Open Excel
– Save the worksheet to your U-Drive (Your U-drive is a network drive
accessible on and off campus that you can use as a student at WWU)
• File – Save
(SAVE OFTEN!)
• Use the “Save in:” drop-down menu to navigate to your (U:) drive
• Click your U-Drive, type in a name for the file and save
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Excel allows you to create ledger-like spreadsheets that can perform
automatic calculations.
Each Excel file is a workbook that can hold many worksheets. The
worksheet is a grid of columns (designated by letters) and rows
(designated by numbers). The letters and numbers of the columns and
rows are in gray buttons at the top and left sides of the worksheet.
The intersection of a column and a row is called a cell, the cell address of
which is the column letter and the row number.
Cells can contain either text, numbers, or mathematical formulas.
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• You are investigating the effect of distance away from low-tide
on the abundance of two different intertidal species along a
transect (a linear sampling scheme).
• The data used to describe these two organisms’ distributions have
been fabricated to illustrate the points of this tutorial.
Species 1
Transect line
Species 2
ocean
Low tide
Transect length = 10 meters
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• Step 1: Enter the following data into Excel:
– Start by clicking on cell A1. The cell is now “highlighted”. Type the word
“Distance”. Use the arrow keys to move to other cells to finish entering the other
table data.
– Enter YOUR LAST NAME in parentheses in cells A13 and A14. You would not
ordinarily do this for a figure in a report, it is simply for this assignment only.
Notice that when a cell is
highlighted, you can also
see the contents of the
cell in the formula box.
Enter your own last name in
these cells.
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Step 2: Enter formulas to calculate totals and averages.
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•
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Put away your calculator!
Excel can compute simple and many complex calculations for you. You just need to know how
to communicate with the program. There are many ways to start enter formulas, we will try a
couple different ways.
You want to sum up all of the organisms you counted to get total number of organisms for each
species.
– Click on cell B12.
– Type =sum(
– Now you need to highlight the
cells that you want Excel to
add up.
– Highlight cells B2:B11. Do
this by placing the cursor in
cell B2, then click and hold
the left button while moving
the cursor to cell B11.
– Press Enter.
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Step 3: Copy the formula from B12 into C12.
•
There are many ways to copy and
paste. Feel free to use whatever
you know. Here’s one way.
•
•
•
•
Right click cell B12.
Click Copy
Right Click cell C12
Click Paste
•
NOW, click once on cell C12.
Look at the formula bar at the
top, notice that Excel changed
the column from B to C in your
formula, thereby referencing the
correct cells in column C that
you want to use to sum the totals
for species 2.
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Step 4: Calculate the average number of individuals for
the first 5 meters and the second 5 meters.
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Here’s another way to enter a
formula.
Click on cell B13.
Click the “fx” button next to the
formula box.
The Insert Function window
appears.
Search for the average function,
type average into the top box.
Click on AVERAGE
Click OK
Note, that the AVERAGE
function in Excel, calculates the
Mean value.
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Step 4: Continued
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The Function Arguments window
appears. Notice the cells that Excel
suggests are not correct for calculating
the average number of individuals in
the first 5 m.
Move your mouse back to the
workbook and select cells B2:B6.
Click OK.
Instead of copying and pasting the
formula for Species 2, TRY THIS:
Click cell B13.
Move the arrow to the small black box
in the bottom right corner.
The arrow should change to a
Click the small black box and drag it
over 1 cell.
Release. The formula has been copied
over.
To make sure: double-click cell B13.
You’ll see the formula and the
Don’t worry about this, if you are curious. Click it. 13
selected cells. PRESS ENTER.
+
+
Step 5: Enter formulas to calculate the average for the
second 5 meters.
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Enter a formula into cell B14 to
calculate the average for cells
B7:B11.
Copy the formula from B14
into C14.
You may not be able to see the
entire contents of cells A13 and
A14.
Move your arrow to the top of
the columns so that it is
touching the line between
columns A and B.
The arrow should change
shape; now, widen the column
by either clicking and moving
the column, or double-click,
which will widen it to fit the
longest text.
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Step 6: THINK.
• Before you make a figure, think about the question you are trying to
answer:
– Is there a difference in the average number of organisms for the two
species between the first five meters and the second five meters of
the transect?
– Now  What kind of graph will best show what you want to know? Bar?
Scatterplot? Pie?
So, let’s make a figure with distance on the x-axis, and average number
of organisms on the y-axis.
• Then we’ll plot, as vertical bars, the average number of organisms
we calculated for each species for each 5 meters.
• HINT: It helps to think about what it should look like.
– Look at the data – THINK and maybe even make a quick sketch
Number
Distance
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Step 7: Highlight the cells you want to graph and make
a scatter plot using Chart Wizard.
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Click on the “Insert” Tab
Highlight cells B13:C14.
Click the “Column Chart”
button on the Charts toolbar.
•
Chart sub-type: Click on the
upper left box that shows just
separate bars (no 3d).
When you are finished with the
assignment, try making different
chart types just to see what they
are like. For a challenge, see if
you can make an XY scatter plot
of all of the data (not averages
or totals). Maybe even add a
trendline.
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Step 7 (Cont): Organizing the data by columns or rows
Your chart has been created,
but there’s a lot of formatting
that still needs to be done.
If your chart looks like the one is
this picture, it is reading the data in
rows. We want the data to be read
in columns however. To fix this
problem, right click on one of the
bars, then click “Select Data…”
In the “Select Data Source”
window, click on the “Switch
Row/Column” button. This will
change the orientation of the way
the data are read. Keep this
window open…
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Step 7 (Cont.) – adding series names
• To add series names,
highlight “Series 1”under
the heading “Legend
Entries”. Then click the
edit button and change the
name to “Decorator Crab”
• For Series 2, change the
name to “Purple Seastar”.
• In case you’re unsure of
which data are from which
series, you can highlight the
formula under Series
Values, and the cells it
references will be
highlighted
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Step 9 Continued – adding data labels
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It looks good, but the columns and
x-axis could be better labeled.
Click “Edit” under “Horizontal
(Category) Axis Labels”
Highlight the cells you want to use
for your labels (A13:A14). Click
OK.
Click OK when you return to the
main menu.
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Adding axis labels
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Left-click anywhere on the
chart.
At the top of the screen, on
the main menu bar, click on
“Layout”.
Under “Labels,” click on
“Axis Titles,” then click the
buttons in the picture to the
right.
Label the x-axis “Transect”
and the y-axis “Number of
individuals”
Your figure should look like
this now:
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Step 7 (Cont.) Adding a
Title
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The title of a figure should
ALWAYS go at the bottom of the
figure. Excel doesn’t seem to
understand this though. For now,
we’ll put it at the top of the figure.
Click on the buttons to the right.
Type the following text into the text
box that was just created
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–
•
A figure title should always start with the
word “Figure” and a number representing
the order at which the figures appear in a
report or paper.
The figure title should be a short
descriptive sentence or statement that
tells the reader enough information about
what is shown so that the figure could
stand alone without supporting text, and
still make sense. Don’t forget the period
at the end!
For this assignment you must
include YOUR LASTNAME in
parentheses at the end of the title.
You would not ordinarily do this for
an assignment
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Step 7: Continued - more formatting
•
Click the Gridlines tab, then the other
buttons shown to the right to remove
them.
– Gridlines are distracting for most
figures and are often removed.
•
Click the Legend tab.
– The legend is helpful in this example
and a right alignment is OK – you
don’t need to do anything here, but
it’s good to know how to change the
legend.
•
Explore the other tabs in the Layout
section so that you are familiar with
the functions that you didn’t use for
this assignment.
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Step 8: FIX-IT!
Properly formatting the Figure so it looks good.
•
Great job! But the figure could benefit from
additional formatting, so let’s make some
changes!
•
First, resize the figure so that you can see it better. This
step is important!
–To resize, select the figure, then click and drag the small
box at the bottom right corner and make the figure larger
and change its shape.
–You should be able to clearly read all axes, including the
scale on the y-axis.
•
Many of the formatting tools can be found by rightclicking inside the chart, in the white space.
–Right-Click in the chart area.
–Select Format Plot Area.
–Click on Border Color.
–In the Border Color box, select No line.
–Click Close
Explore some of the
other right-click
options.
–Right-click the chart and select Font.
• The font in your figure should match the font in
your paper or report.
–Select Times New Roman, Regular style size 12 (or as
low as 10 if necessary).
–Click OK.
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Step 8: FIX-IT! Remove gray background and move the
title to bottom of the figure.
•
By default, Excel 2007 uses a white
background, which is what you want. If
you needed to change the background of
your figure for some reason, you would
right click on the chart area, select “Format
Chart Area.” Then click on Fill. For this
assignment, you want to keep the
background white.
•
Click once on the Chart Title.
–
A gray box appears around the title.
•
Click on the gray box and drag the title to
the bottom of the figure.
•
Now, to make room for the title below,
click once in the plot area and drag the
figure up.
So far, your figure should look
similar to this one.
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Step 8: FIX-IT – Change the data series to grayscale.
•
Typically, figures should be formatted so
that they are readable when printed in black
and white.
– Try to remove colors and, if necessary,
change the shading or patterns of your
data series so you can more easily
distinguish them.
•
Right-click one of the bars for the crab
species.
Click Format Data Series.
Under Fill, select a dark gray color
Click Close.
For the seastar species, change the color
to a very light gray.
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•
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Step 9: Change the y-axis scale so that the
maximum is 10 individuals.
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The scale of both axes are
adequate, however, let’s
change the y-axis so that the
maximum is 10 organisms.
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Right-click the y-axis.
Click Format Axis
Change the Maximum from
Auto to Fixed.
Change the Maximum to 10
Notice that there are other
aspects of the Y scale that can
be changed from this window.
Likewise, if necessary, the X
axis scale can be detailed if you
right click on it.
Click Close.
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…and one more time for good measure: make sure the plot area is large
enough so the data and all labels can be easily read and interpreted.
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CONGRATULATIONS!!
• SWEET! You’ve just made a properly formatted
figure – these general formatting guidelines will
apply to many of the Biology classes you take here.
• Look it over: what do you think? Does it make
sense? Can you see any trends in the data?
• Work through the Figure checklist/rubric included in
the next slide to make sure you haven’t forgotten
anything.
• It’s easiest to make changes to your figure before
you move it into a Word document.
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Figure checklist/rubric
This rubric is similar to the one on your upcoming Results section assignment,
so make sure you understand how to do all of these things!
___Without gridlines
___White background
___Without border around plot area
___12 pt font
___Times New Roman font type
___Regular style font (no bold)
___Caption at bottom of figure
___Caption is a title that states what the figure is showing (use title provided)
___Correct capitalization is used for caption
___Caption begins with "Figure X. ..." and ends with "."
___Caption includes your last name
___Legend is included and correctly labeled
___Color is adjusted for printing in black and white
___x-axis labeled correctly
___y-axis labeled correctly
___Figure is large enough to read/interpret
___Axis is scaled to 10
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Next: copy the figure to a Word document
• Open a new Word document.
• Double check your formatting
• Click in the white space above your legend to
select the figure.
– Press the Ctrl key, and then the C button (This is a
short-cut way to copy something).
• Paste your figure into the Word document.
– Right-click, Click Paste.
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Format a table …
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Note 1: Raw data will not typically be included in a lab report. We will do
the following to practice the proper approach to formatting tables for
scientific papers.
Note 2: The table could be built in Word alone, but it is sometimes better to
build it in Excel, especially if formulas are involved and then copy it to Word
and do final formatting and adding a caption there. These formatting
commands work the same in Excel and Word.
Note 3: As in figure formatting, the formatting of tables should be done to
highlight and clarify the data you want to show. There are certain rules (see
the grading rubric several PowerPoint slides hence) but much of formatting
tables is subjective – what looks the best. The following are suggestions.
In your Excel worksheet highlight all of your data, cells A1:C14.
– Right-click, Click Copy.
Now move to a blank cell below, A26 and,
– Right-click, Click Paste Special (not Paste alone), then Values. This will
copy all your data to a new table, including the averages (not the formulas)
you previously calculated. This table can be formatted without worrying
about changing your figure which references the original table.
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… format a table …
• Now we can clarify some of the information in the table
– Click on A26, move the cursor to the end of “Distance” and add “ (meters)”
– Click on B26, replace “Species 1” with “Decorator crab”
– Click on C26, replace “Species 2” with “Purple seastar”
• Don’t forget! You will need to resize these columns to fit the new headings.
– Highlight B25 & C25 together; right click and click on Format Cells, choose the
Alignment tab, then click to select the Merge Cells box
– In the merged cell, type “Number of Individuals”
• Highlight the entire table and center-justify all cells by clicking on
the
icon on the spreadsheet menu bar.
• We want to add some horizontal lines to separate parts of the table
(tables in papers can have horizontal lines but not vertical lines)
– Highlight cells A25-C26. Right click, choose Format Cells, then the Border tab. Click on
the medium thick line, 5th one down in the right column in the Style box to the right. Now
click on the areas above and below (but not between) the four “texts” in the box to the
right. Press OK. This will place a heavy line above and below the column labels.
– Highlight cells A37-C39. Repeat the operation in the last step, but this time also click on
the area between the “texts” in the left box as well as above and below. Press OK. This
will add horizontal lines separating the last three rows.
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… and copy it to a Word document
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Your table should look something like the
figure to the right.
Now highlight all cells in the new table,
A25:C39.
– Right-click, Click Copy.
Open your Word document, move to below
your figure, press Enter a couple of times and
then paste your table into the document.
– Right-click, Click Paste.
The table should look about as it did in Excel.
Note: Although gridlines show separating all the cells in both Excel and Word,
these will not show up when you print either document – only border lines that
you add will show.
Click on the line above the table and type in the following caption: “Table 1.
Raw data on marine invertebrate distribution in the intertidal zone. Distance
refers to meter intervals on a transect above mean low tide.”
Examine the grading rubric on the next page to make sure everything is okay.
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Table checklist/rubric
This rubric is similar to the one on your upcoming Results section assignment,
so make sure you understand how to do all of these things!
___12 pt font, or 10 if necessary
___Times New Roman font type
___Regular style font (no bold)
___Caption at top of table
___Caption is a title that states what the table is showing (use title provided)
___Correct capitalization is used for caption
___Caption begins with "Table X. ..." and ends with "."
___Appropriate column and row headings
___Units are provided in column/row headings
___Table is large enough to read/interpret
___Lines spaced to fit headings or data
___Appropriate use of gridlines
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Finally, interpret the figure…What’s going on???
• Look at your figure and THINK…What was the question
you wanted to answer? What are the trends in the data?
How does the figure support your findings?
• BIG QUESTION: In the space below your
figure and table, respond to the following
prompts and explain your reasoning with
information from your figure.
– Compare the average number of individuals
of Decorator Crabs and Purple Sea Stars in
the first five meters to those in the
second five meters of the transect.
– Describe the specific differences you can
see.
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What to turn in.
• Due at the beginning of your first 204 lab.
• Turn in a one-page word document that includes:
– Your properly formatted figure and raw data table.
– Your response to the Big Question.
• YOU’RE DONE!!
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