April 16, 2013
Summer Keyboarding Class–How to Win FREE K-8 Keyboarding Curriculum
Every summer, I teach a keyboarding class to 2nd-8th graders. It’s sixty minutes a day, five days a week, for three weeks. This summer, I’m moving it online, through my Keyboard Wiki.
Ready? Don’t need any more information? Click here to join.
There will be two sessions:
- June 24th-July 12th (no class July 4th)
- July 15th-August 2nd
Class will be self-paced, self-managed, the sixty minutes arranged whenever the student can make it fit into summer schedules. Required materials include:
- The Essential Guide to Teaching K-8 Keyboarding–digital or print, as a guide to weekly activities–ebook free when you join class
- membership in the Keyboarding Wiki–also free with the class
- access to the internet and/or Skype
- a full-size keyboard (not an iPad)
The class is ungraded, but those who finish all required steps will get a certificate, attesting to their completion in good standing of this course. The goal of our time together: Prepare students for the demands of 3rd, 4th, and 5th grade academics, improve their typing skills, and their facility with technology.
Here’s what we’ll do:
- start the three-week session with a benchmark speed quiz to see where students are at the beginning and assess how they finish up.
- start each class with keyboarding–Typing Web or DanceMat Typing. I like DanceMat because it introduces keys by rows. Students like it because of the crazy stuff the action characters do. By the end of week two, students must cover their hands with a light cloth to test key knowledge.
- a couple of times a week, exercise fingers to remind students that they are all there–not just pointers and thumbs.
- weekly, take a blank keyboard quiz to promote confidence in letter key placement. Students need to believe in themselves–that they know where keys are without looking at the keys. Of course, the quiz will be on the honor system. If students look at the keyboard during the test, they are the ones to suffer, no one else.
- daily, a variety of keyboarding games to test speed and accuracy of student typing
- Fridays, we do something fun (that reinforces technology skills). After a week of keyboarding, I want students to see how it is used in environs different from straight typing (like creating a Tagxedo)
- At the end of the three weeks, students who complete all required work receive a Certificate of Completion.
Here’s what we accomplished last summer:
- students increased their speed by 10%. This is better than it sounds because the first benchmark test was with uncovered keys, the final with covered
- students knew the placement of all letter keys, as well as spacebar, enter, backspace, tab, escape, shift, ctrl and alt
- students developed resources to carry them through the school year when we didn’t have daily practice
- students enjoyed keyboarding–a major victory considering the amount of memorization required
Questions? Contact me at [email protected]. I’ll answer questions.
Teachers: Whoever has the most students join this class (and mention the teacher’s name)…
will get a free K-8 Technology Curriculum ebook!
What a great deal!
Here’s how to start:
- Join either 3-week program (or both) by clicking here
Jacqui Murray has been teaching K-8 technology for 15 years. She is the editor of a K-8 technology curriculum, K-8 keyboard curriculum, K-8 Digital Citizenship curriculum, and creator of technology training books for how to integrate technology in education. She is webmaster for six blogs, CSG master teacher, an Amazon Vine Voice book reviewer, Editorial Review Board member for Journal for Computing Teachers, presentation reviewer for CSTA, Cisco guest blogger, a monthly contributor to TeachHUB, columnist for Examiner.com, featured blogger for Technology in Education, and IMS tech expert. Currently, she’s editing a techno-thriller that should be out to publishers next summer. Contact Jacqui at her writing office or her tech lab, Ask a Tech Teacher.
