Microsoft Office · Intermediate level

Intermediate level · Module 1: Long Documents, Templates and Mail Merge · Lesson 2 of 3

Section Breaks, Captions and Templates

Control layout in different parts of a document and save reusable organisation templates.

In this lesson you will

  • Use section breaks for landscape pages and different numbering
  • Create a template with branding and placeholders

Key concepts

section breakcaptiontemplate (.dotx)content control

The lesson

Section breaks divide a document into parts that can have different layouts — for example a landscape page for a wide table inside a portrait report, or different headers for the annex.

Captions number tables and figures automatically (Table 1, Figure 2). Cross-references then point to them, and the numbers update if you add a new table.

A template (.dotx) stores the cover, styles, header and placeholder text, so every new report starts correctly formatted. Organisations use templates to keep their brand consistent.

Step by step

  1. Insert a section break and make the annex landscape.
  2. Add captions to two tables and a cross-reference in the text.
  3. Build a cover page and branded header.
  4. Save the document as a Word template and create a new report from it.

Practice activity

Create an organisation report template with a cover page, branded header, styles and a landscape annex page.

Expected result: A reusable template that produces correctly formatted new reports.

Check your understanding

  1. How do you make one page landscape in a portrait document?

    Show answer

    Put section breaks before and after it and change orientation for that section only.

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