How do I scale in, and then extrude a smaller square column up I am 3 weeks in to Blender and completely stuck.  Watched all the videos that show a face selected.  Then the face is scaled in or out then extruded and repeat.  My problem is that I have been unable to find the answer to online or in the manual deals with the scaling part.  The object edges follow my face when I select the face and scale in or out.  I can not just get the face plane to move independently.  Please help.
Have you tried using (g) on your keyboard to grab the face and move it?

you can also extrude in any direction by pressing (e) to extrude, and then the direction you wish to extrude in.

e, x - this will extrude in the direction of X. You can also use (g) after you extrude to fine tune your extrusion

g, x

If this is not what you want, please be a little more descriptive with your question.