Genius Hour: Learning Typing

Week 2: Routines

October 30, 2018



I have no special talent. I am only passionately curious. - Albert EinsteinI started my research on googling: “typing best practices” and I was so excited to see many websites available that could help me improve my typing skills. After surfing to a couple website links, I found the article How to Learn Typing very helpful for beginners in typing. In fact, it provides information about the basic of touch typing such as finger position, home row position fingers, ways to remember key rows, useful free websites and software and thirty-day lessons for beginners. Here are some of the visual aids taken from the article:

Each key is associated with a finger which is color coded for easy reference.
In theory, I learned that each hand, left or right, is in charge of a particular set of letters on the keyboard. Fingers have designated letters. Learning typing starts knowing the home row keys that are the row of keys on the computer keyboard your fingers rest on when not typing. For example, on the standard QWERTY United States keyboard, the home row keys for your left-hand are A, S, D, and F and your right-hand are J, K, l, and ; (semicolon).  The home row keys for letter F and J have a little bump that helps you know where the two pointer fingers should stay without having you to look down. This home row keys is the helpful row for learning finger corresponding letter key because it serves as a reference to moving your fingers up, down and across to find the letters fast while you are looking at the monitor. Besides, I signed up to RATATYPE,  a free online typing resource, that contains a series of guided lessons.

After this search, my goals for learning typing are to practice every day for 30 minutes the lessons from RARATYPE and keep practicing the keyboard finger positions whenever I am writing on the computer.

During this week, I am working on lesson 1 that includes 9 activities in three different levels focused on home row position. Each activity consists of a group of letters that need to be practiced using the color-coded keyboard to help you understand which finger should press each key. Moreover, if you have three miscues or less of 10 Words Per Minute (WPM) the program does not allow you to continue. Then you need to repeat the activity. Below you will find a video showing you how I did one of the lessons on RARATYPE:

Let me describe to you my feelings in regard to working on something that I really wanted to learn for a long time: typing! I am happy about learning something new because typing has its own system and method that I need to explore, understand and use. I am pleased with this Genus Hour because I purposely started a routine with specific goals and I am working on something related to technology that it is my passion lately. On the other hand, I have experienced frustration because trying to coordinate the fingers, with brain and with sight is a task that with time will be developed.  For now, while typing, I feel that I am learning a second language thinking twice or three times as to where to place my fingers to find the right letter and consequently, my speed slowed down. I am very optimistic as well, and I have to be patient and be dedicated to my goal.  I would like to hear from you as to your experience when you started learning something new. 

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