Sometimes you’ll need to include a table in a document but place it so that it’s placed over a series of columns rather than inside the column itself.

To do this, click where you want the table to appear and insert the table at this point.

Hold your mouse over the table and you’ll see the table selector above the top left corner of the table. Click it to select the table and drag the table into position.

The default text wrap settings for a table in Word is that the text wraps around the table so there’s no special option to set to make this happen.

You can widen the table cells as large as necessary. If desired, the table can be sized so it fits the full width of the page or you can make it any size that you want.

To adjust the wrapping of text around a table, right click the table selector (the little square above its top left edge) and choose Table Properties > Table tab. Here you can select how text flows around the table or you can make it not flow around it if you want the table to push the text completely out of its way.

Here too you can alter the alignment of the table – by choosing Left, Center or Right.

This table behavior is consistent across Word 2007, 2010, 2003 and earlier versions.

Helen Bradley