Fun Ways To Develop Keyboarding Skills This Summer!

I have several families who have asked about increasing their child's familiarity with letter location on a computer keyboard. Typically before having a child do more of their writing on the classroom computer or considering assistive technology options for fine motor/handwriting difficulties, it is important for students to be familiar with the keyboard and be able to quickly locate keys. Hunting and pecking is fine, but needs to be able to be done pretty quickly in order for it to be a help and not a hindrance for students.

I've encouraged the families for whom I would like to consider assistive technology for their child next year to have their child practice keyboarding using fun, free online games this summer and to practice keyboarding by emailing a friend or relative this summer.

If you have students who need keyboarding practice, here is a list of great (free!) online resources for keyboarding games:

typingweb.com 

 This site has excellent instruction as well as games. The section under "courses" is unfortunately dull, but good to do if you can get your child to work on it for 5 minutes or so. The section under "games" is fun and good practice. 

 Dance Mat Typing

 learninggamesforkids.com

I hope this will save you some research time if you have students who need keyboarding practice. Here's to counting down the days 'til summer! ~ Kelley