Revisiting the Quick Brown Fox and the Lazy Dog: A New Focus on Keyboarding

In the early ‘90s, I was an elementary school librarian and an adjacent computer lab was part of my domain. Wanting to prepare our fifth graders to become more fluent writers, we ran them through a six-week computer-based typing program in the lab.  

Was it a success? Sort of. Under the watchful eye of a paraprofessional (a self-proclaimed Typing Nazi), the kids were pretty good when working on the keyboarding program — kept their fingers on home row, tried not to watch their hands, etc. When they were in the lab working on other writing projects, and the paraprofessional was busy elsewhere, however, most would go back to whatever hunt-and-peck typing method they had already adopted. But they were generally much faster than before.  

Since then, the keyboarding instruction death knell has been sounded many times, and mostly for good reasons:

• Computer keyboards will soon become obsolete and replaced by voice-to-text systems. (Right, but we’re still not there.) 
• With only minimal exposure to keyboarding instruction, kids — digitally deft creatures that they are — will pick it up quickly and independently. (Not so much.)
• With all that we have to pack into the school day, spending precious instructional time on a mundane task like keyboarding instruction is a low priority. (Hard to argue with that.)

But the recent move by states to high-stakes computer-based assessments has refocused schools’ attention on keyboarding and computer literacy.  To date, the results are mostly anecdotal. But we’re hearing lots of elementary teachers say their students with minimal keyboarding skills struggled on these new assessments. As a result, many schools are once again trying to squeeze keyboarding into their instructional day.

For many of us, this renewed keyboarding focus raises some questions:

• Isn’t there a better way to go about teaching keyboarding than the tired game-based methods we’ve used in the past?
• Do schools really have to devote instructional time to such a task? Can’t we sneak it in somewhere else — or, better yet, include it as an integrated part of daily instruction?
• Why can’t kids just learn it on their own? What can we do to make that happen?  
• Is being able to type at a decent rate really an important life skill, and not just another test prep exercise?
• And, c’mon, have you seen how fast these kids can type with their thumbs?

So to address these lingering questions, I did a review of the research and current best keyboarding practices. Here’s what I gleaned:

• Keyboarding does remain an important lifelong skill. Though a variety of digital devices with alternate entry systems abound (like touch screens and smart phones), most users resort to two-digit typing on these devices. But one’s ability to write fluently — at the speed of thought — on a traditional QWERTY keyboard is still the most efficient means for us to compile and present written information.
• There is no magic solution to learn keyboarding. Like the mastery of driving or reading, keyboarding needs to become an automatic process—one that we don’t have to think about. And, unfortunately, that only comes with practice. It’s estimated that 400 hours of keyboarding is required for one to become a fluent touch typist.
• Like everything else in the digital world, keyboarding programs have continued to advance. Most are still game-based and developers are trying hard to make the task fun. But the graphics and instructional strategies have improved. And some are cloud-based, so the kids can practice anywhere with an Internet connection. And some pretty good Web-based ones are even free.
• Keyboarding doesn’t have to be taught as a subject. Rather than allocating much class time for keyboarding instruction, some schools with 1:1 programs have made it a part of the students’ regular homework. And other schools have effectively incorporated keyboarding into students’ classwork so it’s not taught as a separate and discrete skill.

The Quick Brown Fox Jumps On
Not so long ago, as part of my high school’s college prep curriculum, I took a typing class on a manual typewriter. And since I fancied myself a speed typist, I kept correction fluid close by. With a liberal application of Wite-Out, my finished papers usually resembled the calamine-blotched arm of a mosquito-bitten kid. So I was liberated by the invention of word processors, though that wasn't until graduate school.

By today’s common wisdom, however, keyboarding and computer literacy instruction should begin in elementary school. Kids are developmentally ready to begin keyboarding by third or fourth grade. And postponing consistent and sustained keyboarding instruction until much later could mean the kids develop bad habits that are tough to break.    

So will keyboarding eventually become the unnecessary skill we have long anticipated? Surely it will, just as cursive handwriting instruction is now being disregarded in many schools. But in the meantime, we must apparently still figure out more clever ways for kids to become adept at the not-yet-dying art of keyboarding. Home row! Eyes up! Begin!