Introduction to Spreadsheets
Journalists use spreadsheet software to sort, analyze and summarize data. For example, a journalist might retrieve data from two different census periods, and, after importing it into a spreadsheet application, find the rate of demographic change in a population.
Two popular spreadsheet applications are Microsoft Excel and OpenOffice Calc. The latter is a free alternative to Microsoft Excel. It differs superficially; in this lesson, we will use Microsoft Excel, but everything we will do here is possible in OpenOffice. Google has also developed a free set of applications called Google Docs. These applications are similar to Microsoft Office but allow users to create and share documents, spreadsheets and presentations online.
Here is a tutorial looking at crime data for Durango, Colo. Work through the tutorial, then see if you can make a similar spreadsheet for your own city or town.
Here are some more detailed tutorials about Microsoft Excel. One of the most important, "Import data: Import text files into Excel," describes how to deal with data that is not already in Excel format. This is a common obstacle to data analysis, but it is reasonably simple to overcome using Excel's text import wizard.