How to Use Word 2007 Building Blocks

Building Blocks in Microsoft Word 2007 are built-in templates designed to allow you to create professional-looking documents quickly and easily. Among the Building Blocks included are cover pages, headers and footers, text boxes and watermarks. You can also add your own design, such as a cover page with your company's logo, as a Building Block.

Instructions

Difficulty: Moderately Easy

Using Building Blocks

1. Select the tab on the menu at the top of the page containing the Building Block you wish to use. For cover pages and headers and footers, you would select the "Insert" tab.
2. Click on the element you want inserted on the menu bar that appears under the tab. This could be "Cover Page," "Header" or "Footer," for example. A gallery of options will appear.
3. Scroll through the different designs available and click on the one you want to insert into your document.
4. Type in your information over the content controls. The content controls are areas designated by brackets in which you can type information for your particular document. A cover page, for example, would have the content control "[Type the document title]." You would type over that with the title of your document.
5. Add other Building Blocks to coordinate with the one you've already used by selecting the Building Block with the same style name as the one already in your document. The Cover Page, Header, Footer and Text Box templates were designed to coordinate with one another-just look for the corresponding names.

Creating Your Own Building Blocks

6. Create a document, such as a cover page or a header, that you want to be able to reuse. Select (ie. highlight) the content on the page that you want included as a new Building Block.
7. Go to the gallery that you want to add the new Building Block to. If you were adding a cover page, you would go to the "Cover Page" gallery under the "Insert" tab.
8. Click the "Save Selection" button at the bottom of the gallery. This will bring up a "Create New Document Part" dialog box.
9. Fill in the information in the dialog box, including the name of the document, the category and a description. Hit the "OK" button when you are finished to add your document as a Building Block.

Tips & Warnings

• If you change any information in a content control, that information will automatically update in any corresponding content controls. For example, if you have cover page and header Building Blocks in your document, adding or changing the title on the cover page will automatically add or change the title in the header.
• Content control information will remain intact if you change the Building Block template. So, any information you have added to a cover page Building Block will remain intact even if you decide to use a different cover page Building Block.
• Changing the page layout, margins and other formatting elements of your document is not a problem for Building Blocks. They will automatically adjust to fit any changes you make.
• You can only use the "Save Selection" button when you have highlighted content on the page that you want to save.
• The gallery that you were in when you clicked the "Save Selection" button is the gallery that automatically appears in the "Create New Document Part" dialog box. Your new Building Block will be saved in that gallery by default. You can change the gallery using the drop-down menu in the dialog box, though.

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