How to Build a Custom Word Template and Style System

In Intermediate Tutorial 7 you saved a document as a template. That works for a flyer. A 25-page workbook written by several volunteers needs more: a deliberate set of styles, each with one job, so nobody has to format anything by hand and every unit looks like it came from the same place.

In this tutorial you will turn a sample unit of the Course Workbook, formatted by hand from top to bottom, into a style system and a .dotx template. You will plan the styles, build them so they inherit sensibly, add theme fonts and colors, lock down the style list, set up the pages, and test the template the way a new volunteer would use it.

Design a small style set

A style system is a short list of styles where each one has a single job. If volunteers can't tell which style to use in under a second, the list is too long. For the workbook, eight styles cover almost every paragraph:

Two rules keep the set small and robust:

• Use the built-in styles where one exists. Keep the names Heading 1 to 3 and Caption. The Navigation Pane, tables of contents, captions and accessibility tools look for those exact styles. Change how they look, not what they are called.
• Create a style only for something that repeats. A one-off sign on the cover doesn't need a style. Exercises, which appear 60 times, do.

Before

3.2 Percents

Percent means "out of 100".

Exercise 3.4 Write 0.3 as a percent.

TIP - move the decimal point two places.

table 3.1 common fractions

• ✕Every line formatted by hand
• ✕Four fonts, no styles
• ✕Can't be restyled in one step

→

After

3.2  Percents

Percent means "out of 100".

Exercise 3.4  Write 0.3 as a percent.

Tip: move the decimal point two places.

Table 3-1. Common fractions

• ✓Heading 2, Normal, Exercise
• ✓Tip Box and Caption styles
• ✓Theme fonts and colors

Build the styles with inheritance

Every style has a Style based on setting. A style stores only the ways it differs from its base and inherits everything else. The Modify Style box shows this in plain words, for example Normal + Bold, Indent: Left 0.25". That is powerful and also the main source of surprises.

Normal itself is based on (no style): it is the root. Keep the chain short, one or two steps, so you can always predict what a change will touch.

FileHomeInsertDrawDesignLayoutReferencesMailingsReviewViewDeveloperHelp

Normal

Heading 1

Heading 2

Exercise

Tip Box

Caption

Styles

To build Tip Box:

1. Open the Styles pane and click New Style.
2. Name it Tip Box. Set Style type to Paragraph, Style based on to Normal and Style for following paragraph to Tip Box, so a two-paragraph tip stays inside one box.
3. Click Format› then Border: add a left border and a light theme-color shading.
4. Click Format› then Paragraph: add space before and after, and on Line and Page Breaks tick Keep lines together.
5. Leave Automatically update unticked and click OK.

Consecutive paragraphs with the same border settings share one box, which is why Tip Box follows itself. Exercise works the other way: after the instruction line you want ordinary text for the answer, so its following style is Normal. Build Table Text with 0 pt after and single line spacing, so table rows don't inherit Normal's extra space.

Set theme fonts and colors

Don't type font names and color codes into each style. Point the styles at the theme instead, so the whole workbook can change look from one place.

FileHomeInsertDrawDesignLayoutReferencesMailingsReviewViewDeveloperHelp

Themes

Style Set

Colors

Fonts

Paragraph Spacing

Set as Default

Document Formatting

• Theme fonts. In Customize Fonts, choose a Heading font and a Body font and name the pair Tutoring Club. In the Modify Style box, pick the font marked (Headings) or (Body) at the top of the font list, not the font by name.
• Theme colors. In Customize Colors, set the club's green as Accent 1 and a dark gray for Text/Background - Dark 2. Choose colors for styles from the theme rows of the color picker, not from More Colors.
• Save the theme. Design› then Document Formatting› then Themes› then Save Current Theme saves a .thmx file, so other templates (certificates, family letters) can use the same fonts and colors.

Test it: pick a different color set from the Colors gallery. If every heading, tip border and table header changes, your styles are connected to the theme. Anything that stays the same was set with a fixed color; fix it in the style.

Show the right styles and copy them between files

Word ships with dozens of styles. If volunteers see all of them, someone will pick Intense Quote for a tip. The Manage Styles box (the button at the bottom of the Styles pane) controls what people see.

For a writing template, Recommend is usually enough: it guides people without stopping them. Save Restrict for fill-in documents where the layout must not change.

Copy styles with the Organizer. A volunteer already wrote Unit 4 in an old file. Rather than rebuilding styles there, copy them in:

1. In the Styles pane, click Manage Styles, then Import/Export. The Organizer opens on the Styles tab.
2. The left side shows the current file and the right side shows Normal. Under the right side, click Close File, then Open File.
3. Change the file type to All Word Documents (or Word templates), find the workbook template and open it.
4. Select the styles you need and click Copy. Confirm when Word asks to overwrite styles with the same name.

Add page layouts and placeholder text

A template carries more than styles. Anything already in the .dotx appears in every new document made from it, so set up the parts each unit file needs:

• Margins and paper with Layout› then Page Setup› then Margins› then Custom Margins, for example a wider inside margin if the workbook will be bound.
• Headers and footers with the page number, the workbook name and a StyleRef field for the unit title. Tick Different First Page so the cover has none.
• A cover page on page 1, from Insert› then Pages› then Cover Page or one you design yourself.
• Numbered headings from Tutorial 1. The multilevel list lives in the heading styles, so it travels with the template.

[Workbook title]

Tutoring Club · Fort Lee Community Center

[Unit name]

[Volunteer author]  ·  [Date]

Page Break

Unit 1  [Unit title]

Start typing the unit introduction here.

• ✓Prompt text disappears on typing
• ✓Hard to delete by accident

Placeholder text people can't break by accident. Typed prompts such as [Type unit name here] get half-deleted, left in, or formatted by accident. Content controls are better: they show gray prompt text, select it all with one click, and vanish when the person types.

• No extra tab needed: Insert› then Text› then Quick Parts› then Document Property and choose Title or Author. These controls are linked to the file's properties, so the title typed on the cover also appears in the header.
• Custom prompts: the Developer tab adds plain text, date and drop-down controls, and can lock a control so it can't be deleted. You will build these in Tutorial 6 of this level, on fillable worksheets.

Save, test and version the template

Save the file as a template: File› then Save As› then Browse, set Save as type to Word Template (*.dotx), and name it Tutoring Club Workbook.dotx. Word switches to your personal templates folder. Choose Word Macro-Enabled Template (*.dotm) only if the template must carry macros.

Test it like a volunteer. Close the template, then:

1. Go to File› then New, open the Personal tab and click the template. The title bar should say Document1 or similar, not the template's name. If you see the template name, you opened the template itself.
2. Fill in the cover controls and check that the title appears in the header.
3. Type a heading, an exercise, a tip and a small table using only the Styles gallery. Check the numbering, the page breaks and that only your recommended styles show.
4. Paste a paragraph from a web page with Ctrl+Shift+V (Keep Text Only) and check that it picks up Normal.
5. Write down anything that felt unclear, fix it in the template, and test again.

Common mistakes

Practice

Practice

Turn a hand-formatted unit into a style system and template

Guided practice

Download the example file above and open it in Word. It is a sample unit of the Course Workbook where every heading, exercise, tip, table and caption was formatted by hand with different fonts, colors and spaces.

1. Audit: open the Styles pane (Alt+Ctrl+Shift+S) and click through the paragraphs. Use Style Inspector or Shift+F1 to list each kind of hand formatting you find.
2. Theme: in Design› then Document Formatting, create custom theme fonts and colors named Tutoring Club.
3. Root style: modify Normal to use the (Body) font and the spacing you want for body text.
4. Build styles: create Exercise, Tip Box and Table Text based on Normal, and modify Heading 1, Heading 2 and Caption. Set each style's following paragraph as in the table in this tutorial.
5. Apply and clean: apply the styles, using Home› then Editing› then Select› then Select Text with Similar Formatting for repeated items. Then press Ctrl+A, Ctrl+Space to strip leftover character formatting, and delete the spaces used for indents.
6. Limit choices: in Manage Styles, show your styles on the Recommend tab, hide the rest until used, and set the Styles pane to show Recommended styles.
7. Pages: set margins, add a header with the workbook name and a footer with page numbers, and add a cover page with a Title document property control.
8. Save and test: delete the sample body text, save as Tutoring Club Workbook.dotx, close it, and create a new document from File› then New› then Personal. Type one exercise and one tip to test.

Independent challenge: Version 1.1

Save a document made from the template as Unit 1 test.docx. Then open the template itself, change Tip Box to a blue border, and save it as version 1.1 (archive the old one). Open Unit 1 test.docx: did the tip change? Bring the new Tip Box in with the Organizer, and explain to a volunteer, in two sentences, why the document didn't update by itself.

Reflect: which document do you remake by hand every year, and which five or six styles would its template need?

Check your understanding0 of 4 correct

Pick an answer to see whether it's right and why.

1. 1. Exercise is based on Normal and doesn't set its own font. You change Normal's font. What happens to Exercise paragraphs?

   • Nothing, styles never affect each other
   • They switch to the new font, because they inherit it from Normal
   • They turn into Normal paragraphs
   • Word asks you about each one

2. 2. Why should Tip Box use itself as the style for the following paragraph?

   • So a tip with two paragraphs stays inside one box
   • So the tip prints in color
   • So the tip appears in the table of contents
   • So the next exercise is numbered

3. 3. You want volunteers to see only the workbook's eight styles in the Styles pane, without blocking them from bold text. What do you use?

   • Restrict Editing with formatting limits
   • Delete the other styles from Normal
   • Set as Default on the Design tab
   • Manage Styles > Recommend, then show Recommended styles

4. 4. You updated the template's Heading 1. Units written last month still show the old Heading 1. Why?

   • The template file is damaged
   • Word only updates templates on Mondays
   • Each document keeps its own copy of the styles
   • The units were saved as PDF

You're ready to move on when

Tick each one off as you go. Your ticks are saved in this browser only.

• Your template has a short named style set with clear jobs, built on the built-in headings and Caption
• Each style has a deliberate Style based on and Style for following paragraph setting
• Styles use theme fonts and colors, and you know what Set as Default changes
• Only the template's styles are recommended, and you can copy styles between files with the Organizer
• The template is saved as .dotx, tested from File > New > Personal, and versioned with an archive of old copies