Creating Paystubs with Microsoft Excel

One excellent use of a spreadsheet is to create a paystub. For lower level students, you can create the spreadsheet template for them so they only have to enter the figures and for higher level students you could use the following instructions to have them create their own spreadsheet template in which they then enter the figures. If your students are novice computer users you could complete the entire spreadsheet including the figures and then just use the completed spreadsheet to discuss how to read a paystub.

Literacy Objective:
Learners will be able to read and understand vocabulary relating to paystubs.

Computer Objectives and Levels:
Novice: Learners will be able to open a spreadsheet and find information.
Intermediate: Learners will be able to input data into a spreadsheet template.
Advanced: Learners will be able to create a spreadsheet from scratch, including formulating cells.

Materials:
Microsoft Excel or another spreadsheet software program, sample paystubs and lists of data to be input.

Introduction:
Before you begin this computer component, your students should be familiar with the vocabulary and abbreviations related to work and paystubs. You will also need to spend a fair amount of time introducing or reviewing the necessary Excel vocabulary so that the students will feel comfortable when using this program. The computer words you should teach before beginning this exercise are spreadsheet, cell, column, format, alignment, text wrap, calculate, formula, highlight and click. They should also understand how the cells are named (e.g., ColumnRow, C1, D8).

Procedure:
To create a paystub follow these instructions. If at any time you run into problems while trying this exercise, the Help feature in Excel is exceptional and should get you through any difficulties that may arise.

1. Open Microsoft Excel. (These instructions are based on Excel 97.)
2. To add the titles for each column:
   1. Highlight the first 13 cells across the first row of the spreadsheet.
   2. Click on Format. Click on Cells.
   3. Click on the Alignment tab. Choose wrap text. This will allow all of the words to fit inside the cells. Click OK.
   4. Type in the names of the columns, using the tab key to move to the next cell to the right. The names needed for this lesson are Week Ending, Reg. Hours Worked, Reg. Rate, Reg. Pay, Overtime Hrs. Worked, Overtime Rate, Overtime Pay, Gross Pay,C.P.P., E.I., Income Tax, Total Deductions, and Net Pay.
3. If you look at the bottom of the page you will see that Excel has given you 3 sheets to work with. To remove the sheets you don’t need:
   1. Click on Sheet 2.
   2. Click on Edit.
   3. Click on Delete Sheet. You will get a warning message. Click OK.
   4. Repeat these steps to remove Sheet 3.
   
4. Next you need to format the cells that will contain the figures. Column A should be formatted as Date. Columns B and E should be formatted as Number. Columns C, D, F, G, H, I, J, K , L and M should be formatted as Currency. To format a column: