In Word, each thing you draw is considered an object. Think of the white area as a piece of paper and you are simply arranging different shapes and lines on top of it. It is important you can visualize the different layers when you put one object over another. Word lets you bring objects up and down through the layers. To perform an operation on a object, you must select it. Select it by click on any part of it. Beware: if your object has no fill (sometimes its difficult to tell white from "no fill") then you MUST click on the lines of the object (vise versa if the object has "no line"). You can select multiple objects to perform an operation on all of them, to move them together or to group them by holding shift and clicking on each object.
When you create complicated pictures, the number of objects floating around are numerous. It is often smart to group different objects together. For example, if your picture consists of a bike, a house and a mailbox, you should take the components of each and group them separately. This way, if you click on any component of the bike (wheel, seat, etc.) you will select the whole bike. This prevents accidental screw-ups and makes your drawing much more organized. It also lets you resize all the components at once (you can make the whole bike large rather than resizing each component).
You can draw a line, rectangle/square, oval/circle, or arrowed line using the related tools in the Drawing Toolbar. Just click the appropriate button and drag across the screen to draw the object. You can also draw textboxes (basically a rectangle with space for you to type text). The AutoShapes menu has a bunch of pre-defined shapes you can draw also. After you draw an object, you can scale/distort it by selecting it and dragging the corners (tiny white squares). You can also move it around by dragging any part of it.
You can change fill/line/text colors by selecting the object you wish to change and clicking one of the following buttons:
(fill, line, text color respectively)
Fill/line/text colors give pictures life. There are five types of fills that can be applied to objects. You can use a single color (just pick one or choose More Fill Colors to create your own):
You can use gradients. To do this, click the arrow next to fill color and select Fill Effects (as in the picture above):
You can use textures. To do this, click the arrow next to fill color and select Fill Effects (as in the picture above). Now click on the Texture tab. Pick a texture and press OK:
You can fill with a pattern (same as above, just choose pattern tab):
Or you can fill with a picture. Do the same steps as above; only this time, choose the picture tab. Now you need to press Select Picture and choose a picture file. This can be any file in JPEG, GIF, BMP formats:
Line colors can be adjusted by selecting an object with lines and clicking the arrow next to the line color button. Select a color or choose More Line Colors. You may also choose Patterned Lines to create patterned lines. Choose your pattern and colors. Thickness and style of the lines can be adjusted by pressing the Line Style button and choosing a thickness or style. Through this command, you can make double or triple lines. Lines can be dashed by pressing the Dash Style button and choosing a style. Here are some lines with a combination of these changes applied:
The first line has its thickness and color changed. The second line is a patterned line with its thickness changed. The third line has its style changed to a triple line and has also been dashed. The last line has its color changed and has been dashed.
Shadows and 3-D effects are really effective when used in the appropriate
situations. Simply select an object and click on the shadow 
or 3-D 
button. Each
effect has various angles and appearances you can choose from. There are many
possibilities with shadows and 3-D (especially 3-D) that can be used to create
some interesting objects. These advanced features will be covered later.
WordArt is a mini-program in Office that lets you create cool-looking text
effects. To use it, click on the WordArt button 
.
A gallery of pre-defined styles appear. Pick one. Enter the text you wish to
stylize and press OK. Now your text is an object and has the chosen text effects
applied:
You can further customize the WordArt using the WordArt toolbar. This toolbar should appear when you select the WordArt (if it does not, open the toolbar by using the steps to show the drawing toolbar in the introduction). Here is the toolbar:
You can edit the text with the Edit Text button. You can choose another
pre-defined style with the 
button. You can format the color/lines of the text by using the 
button. The window that pops up should look similar to the window for Format
Object. You can choose the fill color and the lines of the block text. The 
button lets you change the shape of the text. 
lets you rotate it. We will cover the functions of the other buttons later.
ClipArt is sometimes useful if you can find one that matches your needs. You
can even incorporate them into your Word graphics. The amount and kinds of
clipart varies on each computer (It depends on the software and if you imported
any from other sources). To insert ClipArt, click the ClipArt button 
.
A gallery will pop up. This gallery also varies depending on the version of Word
you have. You can then find/choose a picture and insert it into the document.
After a ClipArt has been inserted, it is treated as an object. ClipArt can be
used in two modes: inline with text or floating. These topics will be covered
later.
