Digital Maestro Magazine

Microsoft
Class
Notebook
For
OneNote
Quick to setup and manage
Easily distribute content
Engage and collaborate with students

create tables • write math equations

digitalmaestro.org April 15, 2018
Microsoft Class Notebook for OneNote

OneNote is one option we can use to reduce the amount of paper used in
the classroom. Think of what you can do with over 3 million dollars in your
district.

Use Office 365 to create and distribute documents, spreadsheets, and

presentations. Scan existing documents and serve them to students as PDF
documents. Use the drawing tools to markup any of these document
formats. I like doing things this way because it really saves me time and
effort. I can make changes to documents at any time. Copies distributed to
students are updated almost immediately.


 Alex Reyes

The cover image for this issue came from pexel.com.

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Microsoft Class Notebook for OneNote

Table of contents
Class Notebook …………………………………………………………………………1
Creating A Class Notebook …………………………………………………………..2
Student Notebooks ...........................................................................................6
Adding or Removing Students ………………………………………………………..7
Removing Students ...........................................................................................8
Adding or Removing Teachers ………………………………………………………..9
Adding Teachers ................................................................................................9
Removing Teachers .........................................................................................11
Adding Sections to OneNote ………………………………………………………..12
Adding Sections For All Students …………………………………………………..13
Creating Sections For Individual Students ........................................................15
Teacher Only Section …………………………………………………………………16
Renaming Student Notebook Sections ……………………………………………17
Renaming Individual Student Notebook Sections ……………………………….18
Renaming Class Notebooks …………………………………………………………19
A Note About The Name Change ....................................................................21
Archiving Class Notebooks ………………………………………………………….22
Viewing Archived Class Notebooks .................................................................. 25
Collaboration Space and Content Library …………………………………………26
Extra Stuff ........................................................................................................27
Locking Down The Collaboration Space …………………………………………..28
Basic Text Notes With OneNote …………………………………………………….29
Paragraph Styles and Fonts .............................................................................31
Text Boxes .......................................................................................................32

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Microsoft Class Notebook for OneNote

Class Notebook

Class Notebook is part of Office 365 for The last notebook, Collaboration Space, is
education and OneDrive for Business. used for teachers and students to work on
Teachers and students need an organization collaborative assignments and projects.
account to access OneNote Class This section can be edited by teachers and
Notebook. This is usually an email, which is students. All these notebooks are created at
created for teachers and students. Office the end of the setup process we will be
2016 suite of applications don’t need to be going through in this first lesson.

installed to use Class Notebook. Class

Class notebooks are ideal for student-
Notebook is a cloud service.

centered learning. They provide

A Class Notebook can be accessed with opportunities for students to collaborate
the OneNote application once it has been and discuss their learning and discovery.
created with the Cloud service. OneNote is Teachers can monitor student progress and
available for a variety of devices. These provide input without intruding on the
devices include Windows desktops, student's learning process. They can be
laptops, Surface tablet, iPad, iPhone, used to diversify the learning process.
Chromebook, and various Android devices.
Notebooks can be used to provide
formative assessment and feedback to
OneNote syncs notebooks with Office 365
students.

cloud service when it's connected to the

Internet. This means that notes are stored These cloud-based notebooks make it ideal
on the device and synced to the Cloud for teachers to provide quick feedback to
when Internet access is available. When many students or to give more detailed
Internet access is not available, the input for individual students. Teachers
notebooks are still editable.
feedback and assessment is immediate.
Providing immediate feedback gets
A Class Notebook includes three sub-
students to evaluate the feedback in the
notebooks. These notebooks include
moment rather than days later when the
Student Notebooks, Content Library, and
content and focus is no longer fresh.

Collaboration Space. The Student

Notebook is a notebook that is accessible Class Notebooks can be used to build a
to individual students and to the teacher. community of learners with students in their
Student notebooks aren't viewable by other class and with other teachers and students
students. The Content Library notebook is a around the world. Notebooks are an
notebook where teachers can share excellent way for students to construct
material with students. The content in this learning portfolios, which can then be used
notebook cannot be edited by students. by students for reflection. 


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Microsoft Class Notebook for OneNote

Creating A Class Notebook


To create a Class Notebook, log into your
Office 365 account and click on the
application launcher. The application
launcher is usually available from within any
of the Office 365 online applications like
Outlook. The launcher is located in the
upper left corner of the page.

A series of steps will be listed on the left

side. Office 365 will guide us through the
process of creating a Class Notebook.

Click on the Class Notebook tile.

Provide a name for the class or content that

is to be taught. The name of the notebook
can be anything that is relevant for
instruction. Special class notebooks can be

created for special projects like science
fairs or projects.

The Class Notebook page will open. The

page has four tiles to help create and
manage Class Notebooks. Click on the
“Create a class notebook” tile.

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Microsoft Class Notebook for OneNote

Click the next button.

Notebook is going to be shared with
another teacher in the organization.

Teachers don't need to be entered at this

time. Teachers can be added later in the
Manage Notebooks section. We will cover
this step later.

A message page will inform us that several

notebooks will be created. Click the next
button.

The next step in the process is to provide

the email address of students that will need
access to this notebook. Each address can
be entered individually or pasted from
another application. If the addresses are

going to be pasted, each address must be
We have the option to include other separated by a semi-colon.

teachers in this notebook. This is an Student emails don't have to be entered at

opportunity to provide the names of other this time. It might be better to create the
teachers or aides that will be either co- notebook and setup everything before
t e a c h i n g , s u p p o r t i n g , o r p ro v i d i n g students are invited to the Class Notebook.
instructional content for curriculum and Students can be added later using the
lessons. These teachers will have the same Manage Notebooks section.

access to the notebook as the teacher that

creates the notebook. This means they can If student email addresses aren't available
view student notebooks and access yet, or if you don't want to add students
common classroom sections like the now, click the next button.

Content Library and Collaboration Space.

Teachers do not have access to other
teacher notebooks, which are also created
during this process. Provide the email
address of other teachers if this Class

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Microsoft Class Notebook for OneNote

Class Notebook creates four default The Class Notebook is ready and can be
sections in each student notebook. These opened with OneNote. The OneNote
include handouts, class notes, homework, application can be installed on a computer
and quizzes. We can add more sections at or device. Notebooks can also be opened
this time by clicking the “Add more” button. with OneNote online, which is the Cloud
Sections are places where students can service option for OneNote. Click the option
create their content for teachers to review to open OneNote online.

and grade. It also provides a way for

teachers to help students organize their
work and for teachers to quickly access
student assignments. Additional sections
can be added later in the Manage
Notebooks section. We’ll use these default
sections and click the next button.

OneNote online will open in a browser and

display a welcome page. The notebooks
section contains a list of notebooks created
under Class Notebook. In this example, that
would be the Physical Science notebook.
The Notebooks section includes

Collaboration Space and Content Library.

Click the “Create” button to finish the Each has information and instructions for
process.
using the notebook.

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Microsoft Class Notebook for OneNote

Click on the Notebooks link.

each Class Notebook. These pages contain
information for using the notebook. To
Create a new page, click the “+ Page” link.

The Notebooks page will open, which

contains Class Notebooks and personal

notebooks.
Once the page is created, a cursor will be
placed at the top of the page to provide a
title. This title will appear in the pages panel
for easy navigation to each page.

Clicking the Class Notebooks menu option

will list the Class Notebooks only. Click the

Class Notebook link.

Press the Return key on the keyboard or

click below the title to begin adding
content.

Each notebook has pages for taking notes.

There are several pages created for us with



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Microsoft Class Notebook for OneNote

Student Notebooks

Student notebooks appear in the notebook contains the default sections that
Notebooks panel. These notebooks are were created during setup. Each section
automatically created and added when has its own set of pages. Sections are
student accounts are added to the Class notebooks within a notebook.

Notebook. They are listed in alphabetical

order below Collaboration Space and
Content Library.

Any work that is done in either the online,

desktop, or mobile device version of

OneNote is automatically saved and synced

Click on the disclosure triangle to view the to the Office 365 Cloud.

contents of each student’s notebook. Each

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Adding or Removing Students

Students can be added to notebooks when
they are being created or later in the
Manage Notebooks section. Students can
be added and removed from a Class
Notebook at anytime.

To add or remove students from a Class

Notebook click the apps launcher in Office

365.

Open a notebook by clicking the notebook

name.

Click on the Class Notebook tile.

Enter one or more student email addresses

and click the next button. Separate each
email address with a semicolon.

Click on the “Add or remove students” tile.

Click the update button to add the

students.

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Microsoft Class Notebook for OneNote

Removing Students

Select a notebook from which one or more Click the Next button.

students will be removed.

Click the update button on the confirmation

A list of existing students in the class page.

notebook will be shown in the “Add New

Student” section. To remove a student click
on the Remove link.

The student or students have been

removed from the Class Notebook.

The Remove link will change to an Undo

link.

Click the “Back to home” link.


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Microsoft Class Notebook for OneNote

Adding or Removing Teachers


We often plan and develop lesson plans
with other teachers in our grade level or
with teachers in our department. Other
teachers can be invited to be part of a
Classroom Notebook. These teachers
would have the same access to the Class
Notebook as the teacher that owns the

notebook. Invited teachers would not be

able to delete the original Class Notebook. Click on the “Add or remove teachers” tile.

Only the owner of the Class Notebook

would be able to delete it. Teachers can be
removed from a Class Notebook by the
owner of the Notebook.

Adding Teachers
To add teachers to a Classroom Notebook,

click on the apps launcher.

Select a Class Notebook.

Click on the “Class Notebook” application

tile.

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Microsoft Class Notebook for OneNote

A page will open where we can type the

email address of the teacher or teachers
that will be granted access to the notebook.

Click on the Next button after providing one

or more teacher emails.

A page will display all current and new

teachers. Click the update button to confirm
the addition.

A confirmation page will open where we can

launch the OneNote application.

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Microsoft Class Notebook for OneNote

The following page will list the remaining

Removing Teachers
teachers. Click the update button to confirm
the removal of the teacher.

To remove a teacher, go to the Class

Notebooks app, click on the “Add or
remove teachers” tile, and select a
notebook on the page. Teachers that have
access to the class notebook will be listed.
Click on the remove link next to the
teacher’s name.

A confirmation page will display and we can

open OneNote.

A line will appear through the teacher’s

name and the remove link will change to
undo. Click the next button.

If the confirmation page is missing a

teacher, and you didn’t intend to remove a
teacher account, click the back arrow on the
page.


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Microsoft Class Notebook for OneNote

Adding Sections to OneNote


A class notebook has a section called create a new section, click on the Welcome
Welcome, which is automatically created. section then click on the “add section” link.

Sections can be created to help organize

content for teachers and students. Teachers
can create sections anywhere in a Class
Notebook. This includes creating sections
within student notebooks. Students are
limited to creating sections in their own
notebook and in the Collaboration Space
notebook.

Click on the apps launcher and select the A section name dialog box will open.
OneNote tile.
Provide a name and click the OK button.

Click on the Class Notebooks section and The new section will be created and placed
click on a class notebook.
in alphabetical order with all the other
sections at the top of the sections panel
above student notebooks.

A class notebook includes a Welcome

section that was created during setup. To 


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Microsoft Class Notebook for OneNote

Adding Sections For All Students


Several sections are created in student
notebooks during the process of creating a
Class Notebook. The sections include Class
Notes, Homework, Quizzes, and Handouts.
We can add more sections to all student
class notebooks in the Manage Notebooks
application.

Click on the app launcher in Office 365 and

Click on the “Add section” link in a class
select the Class Notebook tile.

notebook.

Click on the Manage notebooks tile.

A section will be created and a name box

will open to provide a name for the new
section.

A “Manage notebooks” page will open with

all the class notebooks available. The

notebooks are listed in alphabetical order.

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Microsoft Class Notebook for OneNote

Provide a name for the new section. Add

more sections if needed. Click the save
button when done.

Open one of the student notebooks to see

the newly created section or sections.

Click on the link to open OneNote online

and verify that the new section was created.

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Microsoft Class Notebook for OneNote

Creating Sections For Individual Students


In a previous lesson, we learned how to Click on a student notebook to create the
create additional sections in all student new section in that notebook.

notebooks. We can create individual

sections for individual student notebooks.
Being able to create individual sections in
individual student notebooks helps
differentiate content and allows for
individual scaffolding.

A section can be created where we provide

simplified or alternate content for some

students based on their Individual Learning Click on the “add section” link below the
Plan and other students can receive Notebooks panel title.

challenging material to accommodate

Gifted and Talented students.

Click on the apps launcher and select the

OneNote tile.

A section name dialogue box will open.

Provide a name for the section and click the
Ok button.

Click on the Class Notebooks section and

click on a class notebook.

The new section will be added to the

student notebook.

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Microsoft Class Notebook for OneNote

Teacher Only Section


A teacher only section in OneNote Class Click on the option to enable the teacher-
Notebook is an area that is not viewable by only section.

students. It is available to all teachers in a

Class Notebook. This section is valuable for
teachers to prepare material that will
eventually be distributed to students. It can
be used to share ideas, notes, and
materials for lesson plans. Sections can be
created within this area and then shared
with students through links or by copying

the content of the section to the content

library section.
Click on the link to open the class notebook
in OneNote online.

To create a teacher only section, click on

the apps launcher and select the Class
Notebook tile.

The teacher only section will be listed below

the other class notebook sections and
above any student notebooks.

Click on the Manage Notebooks tile.

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Microsoft Class Notebook for OneNote

Renaming Student Notebook Sections


During the class notebook creation process, Click once on a section name to edit the
several sections are created in each student name for that section.

notebook. These sections include class

notes, handouts, and homework. We can
add sections to student notebooks after the
class notebook is created. We can also
change the names of these sections at any
time.

To change the name of sections in a

student notebook, open the Class notebook

application and click on the Manage Change the name of one or more sections
notebooks tile. All the class notebooks and click the save button. The names on all
created will be listed along with the student the affected sections will be updated on all
sections available for each student student notebooks. It would be a good idea
notebook.
to inform students of the change prior to
making any name changes to sections.

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Microsoft Class Notebook for OneNote

Renaming Individual Student Notebook Sections


Sections in student notebooks can be Right click on a section and click on rename
renamed for all student notebooks in a when the contextual menu opens.

class notebook. This provides an easy way

to make sure all student notebooks have
consistent sections that are all named the
same.

Having section names that are all named

the same may not always work in all
situations. In a classroom, we may have a
student who’s native language is not

English. In these situations, it might be Provide a different name for the section
useful to be able to rename the sections for when the section name dialog box opens.
students so they appear in their native Click the OK button to save the section
language. Students can rename their own name change.

sections but as teachers, we often like for

things to be consistent. Naming these
sections ourselves helps when providing
students instructions during a lesson.
Renaming sections can be part of the
differentiation process.

To rename an individual student’s notebook

section, open a class notebook, and click

on the student’s notebook to reveal the

Rename other sections as needed.

sections.

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Microsoft Class Notebook for OneNote

Renaming Class Notebooks


Be careful when choosing to rename
notebooks. This might cause confusion for
students and other teachers that have
access to the notebook. The link in
OneNote for recent notebooks will be
broken and students will need to go to the
Class Notebooks section to open the

notebook with the new name.

OneDrive will open and list all the

To rename a class notebook open any
notebooks created in Class Notebook.

notebook with OneNote. Click on the apps

launcher and click the OneNote tile.

Click once on the notebook that needs a
name change.

Click on the Class Notebooks section and

click on one of the notebooks.

When the notebook opens click on your

account name at the top of the notebook
page.

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Microsoft Class Notebook for OneNote

Click the “rename” option in the menu bar.

The new name will be applied to the
notebook and updated for all students that
have access to the class notebook.

Provide a new name when the “rename”

box opens.

To open the notebook, make sure the

notebook is selected and click Open in the
menu bar. Select one of the options to open
the notebook. We can also open the
notebook online by clicking the book name
link.

Click save after renaming the notebook.

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Microsoft Class Notebook for OneNote

A Note About The Name Change


During the creation of these instructions i When the notebook is opened we do see
discovered that the name change does not the new name change at the top of the
change the original notebook name in the page. It won’t affect the functionality of the
OneNote application. Looking at the notebook but it can be confusing for
notebook in the Class Notebooks section of students and other teachers.

OneNote we see that the name for Biology

Class Period 1 remains unchanged.

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Microsoft Class Notebook for OneNote

Archiving Class Notebooks


At the end of the year we may be tempted When the notebook opens, click on your
to delete class notebooks. I’ve usually account name, which appears at the top of
found it more valuable to hold on to the the notebook page.

notebooks for at least one year. This is

because I’ve been asked to recall or retrieve
student information, notes, assignments, or
assessments from a previous year.
Archiving class notebooks is an excellent
way to remove them from the class
notebooks list and keep them accessible for
future reference.

To archive a class notebook, open OneDrive will open and list all the classroom
OneNote. Click on the application launcher folders created under the account.

and select OneNote.

Select one or more notebooks buy clicking

Click on the Class Notebooks section and to the left of each notebook. Click on the
click on a notebook to archive.
check mark button at the top to select all
the notebooks.

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Microsoft Class Notebook for OneNote

Click the “Move to” button in the button bar.

Select the newly created folder in the panel
and click the Move button at the top of the
A panel will open on the left side of the panel.

page. The panel lists several folders that are

part of your OneDrive account. We’ll create
a folder to archive these notebooks. Click
the “New Folder” button.

A message will display at the top of the

page informing us that the notebooks have

been moved into the folder.

A folder will be created and we will be

prompted to provide a name for the folder.

Provide a meaningful name and click the

“Create” button.

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Microsoft Class Notebook for OneNote

Click on the application launcher and select Go to the Class Notebook section. The
the OneNote application.
notebooks will no longer appear as part of
the class notebooks.

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Microsoft Class Notebook for OneNote

Viewing Archived Class Notebooks


To view an archived folder we need to
access OneDrive. Click on the application
launcher and select OneDrive.

Click on a notebook to open it with

OneNote online.

The archived notebooks, in this example,

are in a folder titled “Archived Notebooks”.
Click once on the folder to open it.

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Microsoft Class Notebook for OneNote

Collaboration Space and Content Library


OneNote Class Notebooks includes special Click on the Class Notes section and select
notebooks that are created during the class a class notebook.

notebook setup process. These notebooks

include Collaboration Space and Content
Library. Pages can be added to each
notebook to organize content. While pages
are good to create content they may not
always be the best way to organize this
content. Sections can be created in these
notebooks to help organize pages into

logical categories.

Click on one of the class notebooks and

Click on the apps launcher and select click the

OneNote.

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Microsoft Class Notebook for OneNote

Extra Stuff

The pages in the section are listed in a
panel on the right side of the OneNote
application. Pages can be added to the
section by clicking the “Add Page” link.

Each notebook is part of the main Physical

Science notebook we created. Each sub-
notebook can have its own sections for

pages of content. Click on the arrow in the
Collaborative Space tab to return to the
Collaboration Space and Content Library main notebook.

folders are listed above the section next to

the tabs. Click on the Collaboration Space
notebook.

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Microsoft Class Notebook for OneNote

Locking Down The Collaboration Space


The collaboration space is automatically
created when a new class notebook is
created. It’s available to all students that
have access to the class notebook. This is
where students can go to work on
assignments, share information, or have
discussions. There may be times when the

collaboration space might not be needed or

when it would need to be locked so The switch will change color and the text
students don’t have access.
will change to read locked. This section will
be locked for students but teachers will still
To lock down this section, open the Class
have access.

Notebook app and click on the Manage

notebooks tile.

The collaboration space can be used to
have students work on projects. Locking
Scroll to a Class notebook and find the
the space at the end of a project can give
“Lock Collaboration Space” option. To lock
teachers time to grade projects without
the space click on the switch once.

students making changes.


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Microsoft Class Notebook for OneNote

Basic Text Notes With OneNote


OneNote is a basic word processor for Text can be formatted in the same way it is
taking notes. It does much more than take formatted in most word processors. The
text notes but text notes lie at the heart of text formatting tools are in the Home
this application. It has basic Word Ribbon. The Home Ribbon in this example,
Processor tools with fonts, text alignment, is hidden. Click on the “Home” button if the
and formatting options. These tools should text formatting options are not visible.

be familiar to just about anyone that has

used a word processor like Microsoft Word.
OneNote uses text boxes and text styles to
format notes on pages. This opens up
formatting and styling possibilities that can
make this more than just a tool for taking
notes.

In the Homework section for a Biology

notebook we will add a page and title it The ribbon will open to display the text
“Animal Classifications”.
formatting options available in OneNote
online.

Click once below the page title to begin

adding text to the body of the page.

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Microsoft Class Notebook for OneNote

We can keep the ribbon open by pinning it The pin icon will be replaced with an arrow
in the open position. The pin option is pointing up. The ribbon will now remain
available on the right side of the page. The open. Clicking the triangle will return the
ribbon is currently not pinned open. Click ribbon to the automatic hide option.
on the pin icon.
Automatically hiding the ribbon is useful if
the screen is small.

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Microsoft Class Notebook for OneNote

Paragraph Styles and Fonts


OneNote, like most moder n word
processors, includes a set of paragraph
style sheets that can be applied throughout
a document. Text automatically receives the
normal paragraph style, which is set to
Calibri font at 11 points.

Using these styles can save a lot of time

when formatting a document. We don’t
have to use these paragraph style. The font
and font style options are available in the
basic text section of the Home Ribbon.

Some of the other paragraph styles

available include Heading 1 through 4. Click
the triangle on the right side of the styles
box to reveal more paragraph styles.

The list of available fonts in OneNote online

is limited to a handful of fonts commonly
available on most computers and devices. If
we use a font on our device or computer

that is not available in the online version,
OneNote will automatically make that font
The additional styles include title, citation available in the online version. I tried this
and quote.
out with several fonts and it works very well.

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Text Boxes

OneNote uses text boxes instead of the
traditional document format. This means we
can have one or more boxes for organizing
notes. Text boxes open opportunities to be
creative with notes and assignments. The
text box is visible when we click on another
section or area of the page.

We are free to place text anywhere on a

page with text boxes.

Text boxes can be resized by moving the

mouse to the right side of the box. The

cursor will change to a directional arrow.

A text box is automatically created when we

click on a page. If we don’t provide content
for the text box, it will disappear when we
click somewhere else.

The text box itself can be moved around the

page by moving the mouse arrow to the
text box bar. The mouse arrow will change

to four opposing arrows. Click and drag the

text box anywhere on the page.

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Microsoft Class Notebook for OneNote

We can use multiple text boxes to create

columns of text.

To delete a text box, click once on the text

box bar so it becomes selected. Press the
backspace key or delete key on the
keyboard.

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Microsoft Class Notebook for OneNote

Digital Maestro
Magazine

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