1 - Introduction

Welcome

Printing a spreadsheet sounds like a small thing, but it is how a budget reaches a supervisor on Work Experience, how a stocktake gets signed off, or how a Key Assignment lands in your teacher's hand. A sheet that splits across four random pages says "I didn't finish this"; a sheet that prints cleanly on one page with the column headings repeated says "I know what I'm doing". Today you'll take your project budget and make it print the way you want.

By the end of this lesson, you will be able to:

Use Print Preview and set a print area so only the useful cells print
Fit a wide sheet to one landscape A4 page with the headings repeated on every page
Export a spreadsheet as a clean PDF that looks the same on any device

Warm-up

Think back to the last time something you printed came out wrong. What went wrong? Extra pages with nothing on them, text cut off at the edge, portrait when you needed landscape, the wrong part of the page? Hold that problem in mind — by the end of this lesson, you'll know exactly how to fix it.

Teacher Notes

Students open their existing {{code:05_project_budget}} spreadsheet at the start — you'll want to check everyone has it before moving on. If any student is missing the file, pair them with someone who has theirs open so they can follow along and configure print settings on a copy.

👇 Mark your steps as done as you complete them.

+5 XP

2 - Key Concepts

Printing a spreadsheet is really six separate settings working together. Learn the names now so the exploration step makes sense.

Concept	Why it matters	Example
Print Preview — a screen that shows exactly what your printout will look like before a single page is used	Screen view and print view are not the same — preview catches spill-over, bad margins, and cut-off columns before you waste paper	Your budget looks tidy on screen but preview shows column E sliding onto page 2 on its own — fix it now, not after you've printed
Print Area — the specific range of cells that will actually print; everything outside it is ignored	Spreadsheets usually have working-out cells, notes, or scrap calculations you don't want on the final copy	Set {{range:A1:E20}} as the print area so a supervisor only sees the finished budget, not your rough calculations in column H
Page Setup — orientation (portrait or landscape), margins, and paper size	A wide sheet with 6+ columns almost always needs landscape; a tall one with few columns prefers portrait	An inventory sheet with Item / Supplier / Price / Qty / Total / Notes needs landscape A4 — portrait would chop "Notes" off
Fit-to-Page (Scaling) — shrinks the whole sheet so it fits on one page (or a fixed number of pages)	Lets you print a working budget on a single page even if it's 25 rows long	—
Repeat Headings — prints the header row (and optionally the first column) on every page of a multi-page sheet	Without this, page 2 of a stocktake has numbers with no column labels — the reader can't tell Price from Quantity	On a 3-page supplier list, pages 2 and 3 still show "Item / Supplier / Price" at the top so the reader never has to flip back
Export to PDF — saves a print-ready file that looks identical on any computer, phone, or printer	Emailing a PDF to a supervisor means they see exactly what you designed; emailing the raw spreadsheet means they might see it differently	Attach a PDF copy of your budget to an email — the supervisor opens it on their phone and the layout still holds

👇 Mark your steps as done as you complete them.

+10 XP

3 - Explore the Print Settings

Open your {{code:05_project_budget}} spreadsheet and open Print Preview ({{kbd:Ctrl+P}} on Windows/Chromebook, {{kbd:Cmd+P}} on Mac). You're not going to print anything yet — you're going to poke every setting and notice what it does. Close preview with {{key:Escape}} after each experiment so you go back to the sheet cleanly.

In Excel Online the print settings appear in the preview panel on the left ({{menu:File -> Print}}). The ribbon tab called Page Layout also has Orientation, Size, Margins, and Print Area options.

In Google Sheets the print settings open in a dedicated panel when you press {{kbd:Ctrl+P}}. Paper size, orientation, scale, and headers/footers all live in the right-hand sidebar.

Your goal for this step: build up a mental map of which setting controls which part of the printout. You'll apply what you learned in the mini-project next.

Exploration

Open Print Preview on your budget. How many pages does it produce by default? Which column or row causes it to spill onto a second page?
Try Landscape versus Portrait orientation. Which one fits a budget with 5 or 6 columns better, and what gets cut off in the wrong one?
Find the Fit-to-Page setting (Excel Online calls it Scaling; Google Sheets calls it Scale). Try "Fit to width" and "Fit to page" — compare what happens to the text size and readability.
Find the option that repeats the header row on every page. In Excel Online this is Page Layout with Print Titles; in Google Sheets it is Headers & footers with "Repeat frozen rows". Notice when this would save a reader from having to guess what a column means.
Select a specific range on your budget (for example the top 10 rows) and try setting just that range as the print area. Compare the preview before and after — what stayed in, what dropped out?
Compare the preview with gridlines showing versus gridlines hidden. Which looks more like a professional document for a supervisor?

Teacher Notes

Students often don't realise Print Preview is non-destructive. Reassure anyone who looks nervous — nothing prints until they hit the final Print button. Encourage them to change a setting, look at preview, change it back.

+15 XP

4 - Common Issues

Before you configure your own budget for real, here are the problems that catch most students first time.

Issue	Solution
My sheet still prints on multiple pages even after I chose "Fit to page"	Check you chose "Fit sheet on one page" (not "Fit all columns on one page"). The second one only controls width and will still spill vertically.
Page 2 shows numbers with no column headings above them	Turn on Print Titles / Repeat frozen rows so row 1 prints at the top of every page.
The preview shows a huge blank area on the right	You probably have a cell with a space or a stray value far off to the right. Set a print area on just the real data ({{range:A1:E20}} or wherever your data ends).
My text is tiny after fitting to one page	The sheet is too wide for one page at a readable size. Switch to Landscape first, then try Fit-to-Page again. If it's still tiny, consider removing a column or splitting into two pages.
The PDF I exported looks different from the preview	Check the PDF was exported from Print ({{kbd:Ctrl+P}}) with your chosen settings, not from a generic "Download as PDF" that ignores page setup. In Google Sheets use {{menu:File -> Print}} then "Save as PDF" in the destination dropdown.

+10 XP

5 - Configure Your Budget for Print

Mini-Project: Print-Ready Budget

Your goal: Take your existing {{code:05_project_budget}} and configure it so it prints cleanly on one landscape A4 page with the column headings repeated, then export a PDF you could attach to an email to a supervisor without being embarrassed.

Time: ~20 minutes

Task: Open your {{code:05_project_budget}} from your {{code:Digital_Portfolio}} folder. Use what you noticed in the exploration to set a print area on just the useful cells, switch to landscape A4, fit it onto one page, and turn on repeated header rows. Open Print Preview and keep adjusting until it looks right — large enough to read, nothing cut off, headings visible. Once the preview looks good, export the sheet as a PDF and save it in your {{code:Digital_Portfolio}} folder as {{code:44_budget_print_ready}}. This PDF is the version you would hand to a supervisor.

Success criteria:

Your budget prints on exactly one page in Print Preview (not two, not half a page)
The page is landscape A4 and the text is large enough to read comfortably
If the sheet spans more than one page, the header row appears at the top of every page
A PDF copy named {{code:44_budget_print_ready}} is saved in your {{code:Digital_Portfolio}} folder and, when opened, looks identical to the preview

Platform quick reference

Excel Online: Use {{menu:File -> Print}} to open preview. Use the {{btn:Page Layout}} ribbon tab for Orientation, Size, and Print Area. To repeat headings, use {{menu:Page Layout -> Print Titles}}. To export PDF, choose {{menu:File -> Save As}} and pick PDF, or use {{menu:File -> Print}} and pick "Save as PDF" as the printer.

Google Sheets: Press {{kbd:Ctrl+P}} (or {{kbd:Cmd+P}} on Mac) to open the print panel. All settings — paper size, orientation, scale, margins, headers/footers, repeated rows — are in the right-hand sidebar. To set a print area, select the range first, then in the print panel set Print to "Selected cells". To export PDF, in the print panel change Destination to "Save as PDF" and click {{btn:Save}}.

Teacher Notes

This is the lesson's deliverable. Walk the room and look at previews on screens, not final PDFs — catch problems before they save. The most common mistake is choosing "Fit all columns on one page" when they meant "Fit sheet on one page" — the first still spills vertically.

+15 XP

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Print Preview, Print Areas & Page Setup

Teacher Class Feed

1 - Introduction

Welcome

By the end of this lesson, you will be able to:

Warm-up

2 - Key Concepts

3 - Explore the Print Settings

4 - Common Issues

5 - Configure Your Budget for Print

Mini-Project: Print-Ready Budget

Platform quick reference

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