Do you need to use a Euro symbol in an economics paper? How about a Celsius degree in a lab report? Or, maybe you need to insert special characters into your math homework. I recently discovered the Math AutoCorrect feature in Word and realized that I could use it for more than just math stuff.

Math AutoCorrect lets me insert symbols and special characters into my documents using keyboard shortcuts. Click the full post to watch a short video where I demonstrate how to insert symbols and special characters into a Word 2010 or Word 2007 document. I also provide step-by-step instructions and keyboard shortcuts, if that's your preference.

Did you know that it's easy to create a bibliography based on common citation formats in Microsoft Word?

A few months ago, we were asking students about how they write a research paper. Jon, a freshman at a local community college, had just completed a huge term paper that counted for a large percentage of his overall grade in a class. While describing how he wrote this paper, he told me he hated writing bibliographies because he couldn't remember the proper format for citing sources. Unaware that Word has a built-in solution to his problem, he had turned to an online alternative. When I told him about the citation generator in Word he said, "Word does what? Where's that at?"

Check out my full blog post to learn how it's done.

This post about teachers sharing their presentations with students using  Broadcast Slide Show in PowerPoint 2010 was written by Joy Miller.

Nowadays, students bring their laptops, smartphones, and iPads into the classroom to take notes, research online, and work on assignments.  But for many students, it can be difficult to see a presentation from the back of a large lecture hall. Why not embrace the use of digital devices and invite them "in" to your lectures?

Earlier in the year I worked with Beth Melton, an Excel MVP, to create a super easy and visual gradebook template in Excel 2010. It’s built for teachers with little to no Microsoft Excel experience. In fact, all of the grade calculation formulas are taken care of for you. We built the template in Excel 2010, because of all the new 2010 data visualization features. It even includes a printable student progress report!

Take a look at what this new gradebook template has to offer.

Did you know that you can save your PowerPoint 2010 presentations as Windows Media Player (.wmv) video files? Well, you can. And it only takes a few mouse clicks.

You can then burn the video to a DVD, upload it to your blog or video-sharing web site, or email it to your professor to share the video file with people who don’t have PowerPoint installed on their computer. If you're using PowerPoint 2007 there are a few more steps required, but it's still possible.

Read the full blog post to learn how to do this in PowerPoint 2010 and PowerPoint 2007.

Today's blog post is brought to you by Tami Amador, our resident Microsoft Mathematics writer.

Introducing Microsoft Mathematics 4.0, a full-featured graphing calculator. It’s designed to work just like those expensive handheld calculators and it’s optimized for algebra, trigonometry, statistics, and calculus. Additional math tools help you solve systems of equations, evaluate sides and angles in a triangle, and convert from one system of units to another.

Read the full post to find out how to get this new free tool!

Did you know that you can insert professionally formatted formulas and equations into your Word documents? That means you can do your math homework in Word and not get docked points for your illegible handwriting. In addition to that, the free Microsoft Mathematics Add-In for Word and OneNote lets you solve equations and expressions containing real and complex numbers and even plot 2D and 3D graphs. Don't get too excited. It doesn't do all the work for you. You'll still need to show how you solved an equation, but at least this way you can check your work and see if you're getting the correct answer.

If you're a math teacher or student, check out the following video where I demonstrate how to solve equations and plot graphs using the Mathematics Add-In with Microsoft Word 2010. If you're interested in more free math resources, read my full blog post.

A new school year is fast approaching. Teachers everywhere are dusting off their school supplies and getting ready for their next batch of students. But what can they do differently this year to communicate with students outside of class hours?  

Queue WordPress and Windows Live Writer—with these tools you can easily create and manage your very own blog.

Take a look!

According to a survey released Thursday from the National Survey of Student Engagement, many students fail to use effective study techniques to help them succeed in school. The New York Times reported, "The great majority of students take notes in class, but fewer than two-thirds review them later, and even fewer take notes while reading."

During class you present your carefully prepared PowerPoint slides and you hope everyone is listening. But what if your students get confused and don't ask for clarification? How do you share your PowerPoint with them, so they can go through the material at their own pace?

Try embedding your PowerPoint presentation into a blog post.