One of the many issues surrounding technology and schools today involves keyboarding.  We have not accepted the fact that kids need to know how to keyboard just as much as they need to know how to print.  Once a child knows how to type, writing tasks will be so much more beneficial.

I use to subscribe to the keyboarding program school of thought – get a program and have the kids use it.  However, teachers need to know how to use it, it costs money – blah, blah.  So, keyboarding within the confines of the curriculum is my new mantra.  So here is a quick way to do it.

Objective: Practice keyboarding while typing in the names of characters from a story the kids’ are reading. For example, if the kids are in third grade and reading the BFG, they could type in the characters from the story, such as: BFG, Sophie, Child Chewer, etc. You get to review the characters from the story and they can practice their keyboarding.

• From your teacher web site – link to Funbrain.com’s Word Turtle – http://www.funbrain.com/detect/
  
• Choose the options I have indicated below (this is just one variation)
  • Level (select one):
    Hard (10 words, 12 letters long, with reverse and diagonal)
    Style (select one):
    Make Puzzle to Print On Paper (for yourself or friends)
• Have the kids type in their name for the title – this makes it easier for you to find who printed what
• Have the kids type in the character names – you could ask them questions and they have to type in the correct character based on the answer
• When they are all done – have them click Make Puzzle
• Print them from the File Menu of your Firefox browser

They have practiced a bit of keyboarding and you have reviewed story elements