Teaching Access

[neuroman9999]

I would hardly call it a class. It's one waitress where I have breakfast often, but I definitely will download your book.

You know Dick, what I have seen over the last few years is that, literally *everyone* is writing books about almost everything. Why is that, I wonder? I'm just curious.

and in terms of teaching, that's great that you're able to pass your wisdom on to a younger gal. Maybe she can use that for a betterment of her own life. That's exactly what I do. I'm sure you realize the good feelings that come with that, given your age.

By the way, if you want to see some seriously procedural, funny, and technical stuff along the lines of perfection in teaching (j/k), just say so and I'll send you some files in the form of a cirriculum that makes perfect sense. And I'm not putting it on any shelf at a Barnes and Noble (are those stores even still around?). This kind of stuff you certainly won't witness at any college.

 

[strive4peace]

I would hardly call it a class. It's one waitress where I have breakfast often, but I definitely will download your book.

then you'll no doubt get a meal out of it too

one-on-one training is awesome! Usually whoever is learning has something in particular they want to develop, so its good to start building whatever that is as you cover whats on your outline. I'd still do the introduction the same though -- with a wander through objects in a database that has a sample of them all. Set the Navigation Pane Category is set to Object Type. Have HER drive. Tell her what to click and pick (assuming you don't have a presentation machine). then you can sit back and drink coffee

Its good to print your outline and put a check next to things as you cover them because it will be easy to get them out of order. And if you cover topics that aren't on your outline, write them down. As you cover shortcut keys, give her time to write them down. Oh, that's another part of startup ... make sure everyone has paper and pen/pencils (and a clipboard if she's not sitting at a desk). Encourage her to take notes. That will also help her remember. Have fun!

 

[Dick7Access]

Doc,
Sorry about post #5. i had a computer crash.

 

[strive4peace]

Dick , before the training, you might want to share this link to a video about the Navigation Pane. Its old, but well done and still applicable.

Meet the Navigation Pane (6:32)
by DemoTrainer (a Microsoft channel) on YouTube

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7GRii_sTa6M

 

[The_Doc_Man]

The most important part of a database is its purpose. When you describe a database in general terms, the part to emphasize is that it was being built for a reason. That reason will guide you in what to build, what features to add, what to expect out of it, who will use it, etc. Because central to any of this is the idea that a database is an example of a computer application. I.e. you are applying a computer's power to solve a problem. And that problem will be your guide to what you want to do.

 

[Dick7Access]

Hi Dick,

wonderful that you're going to share Access joy! and teach others how to be more productive with this amazing tool!

I put what I consider to be a good foundation for Access into a little book that you can download, and distribute to your class too.

Access Basics
http://www.accessmvp.com/strive4peace
Free 100-page book that covers essentials in Access

To demonstrate concepts, it is good to get some data from one or more students who will be in the class. If data is sensitive, or people in the class aren't in the same department, then replace it with sample data. Often they have stuff in Excel. They pick up more when data with meaning for them is being used.

Take screen shots during the training. Afterward, put them into a Word document or PowerPoint presentation, and send it to the students (or make it available for them to get) so they remember more.

Good luck with your class!

Just skimmed thru your book. Two things caught my eye. 1. your reference to a person named Meyer. My main program for my ministry study is called e-Sword written by a Meyer. 2. (logical Mind) In college I had a course called logic. At the time I thought it was useless until I started programing. Has anybody ever had to endure Apes & Nuts. It is 50 years ago so I don't remember much about it, except it was in the logic course

 

[strive4peace]

However, I might present queries BEFORE I presented forms and reports. Queries are more closely related to table interactions and can form a nice segue to forms and reports, which require recordsets that can be provided by queries.

fwiw, after the overview (then queries come before forms), I like to do more in-depth coverage of forms before queries -- and cover them as they're needed for combos and listboxes. Then cover queries more in-depth before going into reports, just as Dick has them listed.

 

[Dick7Access]

fwiw, after the overview (then queries come before forms), I like to do more in-depth coverage of forms before queries -- and cover them as they're needed for combos and listboxes. Then cover queries more in-depth before going into reports, just as Dick has them listed.

I like forms first because Once I get her to make a simple table which will not make complete sense to her. By usual custom she will want to put each address, phone number etc. with the person's name. she needs to see it all put together. Where? a form of course. Every person's opinion here I appreciate for this reason. Access is part of my ministry but also my hobby. My main calling is Bible. I always learn something when I teach Bible. I learn something no matter what i teach. I will no doubt learn something of value from every post here. I am 22 year retired Navy welder. (a little humor) (true but humor)

I had a bumper come loose on my RV when I was parked at a church in TX. They told me of a man in the church who had a portable welding rig. He came over and we discovered we were not able to get the Bumper bracket as close as it should be. He said we will Hoolie-Arc it. (a take on Heli-Arc) Here I was the retired welder/teacher learning from a young man half my age. Now any welders out there know what “Hoolie-Arc” is?

 

[strive4peace]

hi Dick,

if she wants a contact management system, here is one that is free and fairly basic (I do have one that is more complex). You are welcome to use it for your training too, as with anything I have publicly posted.

My Contacts
https://www.msaccessgurus.com/tool/MyContacts.htm

When you open the database, the contact form opens, where you can manage your most important contact information. When that form is unloaded, the main menu form opens, which also has a command button to delete all the sample data so you can put YOUR contacts in, and choices to open lookup tables for editing.

Humans and companies or organizations are all contacts. Look at Status Bar Text in lower left to see notes for each control as you tab from control to control in the form..

Aside from the obvious (name, dob, address, phone, email, url) ...

"Category" and "Lists" are whatever you want them to be ... you can see some ideas in the sample data.

Head contact is for relating a contact to a company, organization, club, head-of-household, or any other hierarchical relationship that bears the most importance with this contact. For example, if you are on a contact record of someone who works for a company (that is also a contact), you can select the company, creating a relationship between the two records.

 

[Dick7Access]

hi Dick,

if she wants a contact management system, here is one that is free and fairly basic (I do have one that is more complex). You are welcome to use it for your training too, as with anything I have publicly posted.

My Contacts
https://www.msaccessgurus.com/tool/MyContacts.htm

When you open the database, the contact form opens, where you can manage your most important contact information. When that form is unloaded, the main menu form opens, which also has a command button to delete all the sample data so you can put YOUR contacts in, and choices to open lookup tables for editing.

Humans and companies or organizations are all contacts. Look at Status Bar Text in lower left to see notes for each control as you tab from control to control in the form..

Aside from the obvious (name, dob, address, phone, email, url) ...

"Category" and "Lists" are whatever you want them to be ... you can see some ideas in the sample data.

Head contact is for relating a contact to a company, organization, club, head-of-household, or any other hierarchical relationship that bears the most importance with this contact. For example, if you are on a contact record of someone who works for a company (that is also a contact), you can select the company, creating a relationship between the two records.

Thank you for the offer and i will probable look at it for myself, but I am not going to tell her about it. I don't want her to make the same mistake I did 25 years ago. I said this is great down load this, download that, but when I wanted to tweek it, I didn't know how to do anything.

 

[strive4peace]

hi Dick,

Maybe you'll change your mind about sharing MyContacts once you see how easy it is to understand. That database is designed for teaching, while giving you a useful too. There are lots of comments in the code too.

My Access Basics book also uses contact data as the example. Between writing that and making MyContacts, I got better ideas for table and field names, so some of them are a little different.

This video tutorial is about the more complex contact management system, but the lite version is structured pretty much the same way -- it just doesn't have as many features. Also, instead of using subforms for related contact information, MyContacts uses popup forms, which lets you position them to see more at the same time if you have Overlapping windows set in your Access options (instead of the default option of Tabbed Documents for Document Window Options in the Current Database.

Access Contact Template, Contact Management System

I didn't make a video for MyContacts, but wrote a few articles about some of its features:

Managing Contacts
https://sfmagazine.com/post-entry/november-2018-access-managing-contacts/

Cross-referencing Contacts and Lists
https://sfmagazine.com/post-entry/december-2018-access-cross-reference-contacts-and-lists/

Just throwing out ideas in case they can be useful. How soon will you be teaching her? Will it be a series of short sessions? if so, you can give her homework (smile)

 

[Dick7Access]

hi Dick,

Maybe you'll change your mind about sharing MyContacts once you see how easy it is to understand. That database is designed for teaching, while giving you a useful too. There are lots of comments in the code too.

My Access Basics book also uses contact data as the example. Between writing that and making MyContacts, I got better ideas for table and field names, so some of them are a little different.

This video tutorial is about the more complex contact management system, but the lite version is structured pretty much the same way -- it just doesn't have as many features. Also, instead of using subforms for related contact information, MyContacts uses popup forms, which lets you position them to see more at the same time if you have Overlapping windows set in your Access options (instead of the default option of Tabbed Documents for Document Window Options in the Current Database.

Access Contact Template, Contact Management System

I didn't make a video for MyContacts, but wrote a few articles about some of its features:

Managing Contacts
https://sfmagazine.com/post-entry/november-2018-access-managing-contacts/

Cross-referencing Contacts and Lists
https://sfmagazine.com/post-entry/december-2018-access-cross-reference-contacts-and-lists/

Just throwing out ideas in case they can be useful. How soon will you be teaching her? Will it be a series of short sessions? if so, you can give her homework (smile)

I'll check it out.