by Donna Milano
My copy of Microsoft Office XP came bundled with a CD entitled "Step By Step Interactive Training" by Microsoft Interactive Training with LearnIT Corporation Simulation Technology. It looks as if this is a product of MS Press which is owned by Microsoft.
I have evaluated quite a few books, training manuals, training CD's and videos throughout my years of training and writing documentation. Nothing is perfect—not even my own productions. This is one of the better training products I have investigated.
Since this is a simulation, you do not need to have Office XP installed to use the CD. You do need about 180 MB of disk space. I installed it on a Windows 2000 laptop with 526 MB RAM. Installation was a breeze. The training covers the 5 programs included with the Professional version of Office XP: Word, Excel, Outlook, Access and PowerPoint.
The product can be used by several people so the first time you use it you select a Username and Password. Next you select a syllabus: Audio and text, Text Only, or Audio Only. I tried Text Only and was not happy. I preferred hearing and seeing at the same time. One of the most impressive features of the training is the use of alternating male and female voices. This kept my attention and added greatly to why I like the CD. I did not nod off as I have done with other training materials.
Each chapter or lesson begins with a very short animated introduction. At the end of the Introduction you can either start the lesson itself or take a pre-assessment of the topics to be covered. I took each assessment which consists of multiple choice questions. You know immediately if you answered the question correctly. Some of the questions were difficult to understand and I just guessed at the answers. When you answer a question incorrectly the subject area is flagged and you get a message telling you to pay particular attention to that part of the lesson.
When you start the lesson a Dashboard appears on the screen. This is a navigation area with buttons to pause, stop, backup, etc. and where the text that you have to type appears. You can go slightly ahead of the program with typing and clicking, etc. Otherwise the program does a good job of making you keep pace and stay "on the same page" as the directions. There is not a lot of typing involved. Some training programs allow you to avoid typing by pressing the spacebar or an arrow. I could not find a way out! But this is a positive—I was forced to actually pay attention to what I was supposed to be doing.
Big red arrows show you where to click and the training does not progress until you respond correctly.
If you have to stop mid-lesson, you can create a Bookmark to mark your place. You can even create a desktop shortcut to the bookmark if you really want to.
Following each lesson is a summary and then a Quiz on the features you just learned. The results of the pre-assessments and the quizzes are stored in Progress Reports that can be viewed or printed.
I learned in Speech class that good speeches have three distinct parts: tell the audience what you are going to tell them, tell them, and then tell them what you told them—the introduction, the body and the summary. This training program accomplishes this very nicely and adds a training element as a fourth part - the quiz or evaluation.
If you get Office XP and this CD is bundled with it, give it a try. Even as an experienced Office user I became more familiar with a few features that I use infrequently.