Typewriters & Typing
Typing is one of those skills that seems like a vestige of a past era, but is actually more useful and practical than many people realize. The ubiquity of mobile devices means that most people are very comfortable working with an electronic device, but not as many learn how to type properly. At its core, proper typing is an invaluable time-saving skill, as most people will interact with a computer in various capacities throughout their school and professional careers. You can combine typing exercises with a unit study on typewriters to incorporate some history, writing, and social studies into your homeschool typing lessons.
Typing Key Benefits
There are some surprising benefits to learning how to type correctly–including increased productivity and improved posture!–but the best part is that these benefits are equally applicable to students in an educational setting and adults in a professional setting. If you’ve never really gotten the hang of touch typing, this is a great opportunity for you and your student to learn and practice a skill together, and a great way to model continuous learning in your homeschool.
Check out these free lessons to help you introduce typing to your younger students. Starting early and practicing often will allow your children to enter their high school and college studies with fully-developed typing skills.
Typing Logistics
Why aren’t those letters on the keyboard in alphabetical order? It doesn’t seem to make sense, and can even lead to frustration, especially early on in the learning process. There actually is an interesting reason for the order–or disorder–of the letters on the keyboard. While the electronic keyboards of today’s computers don’t have the same limitations as the original typewriters, the placement of the keys has carried over in part due to the familiarity that typists already had with the original layout. Learn how a typewriter works, why the keys are organized as they are, and more.
Typewriters have come a long way since the first patent was issued over 300 years ago. Follow the history and development of the typewriter and keyboard and explore its impact on modern developments in society, economics, and more.
Typing and the Printed Word
Check out this blog post describing the author’s interesting use of an old typewriter. It’s a unique approach that utilizes the typewriter’s appeal to a variety of senses, and demonstrates a great way to tie different learning topics or subjects together.
The invention of the typewriter revolutionized the printed word, and it’s mass production did even more. But, if you’d like to take your study of the printed word further back, check out “Hands-on History: The Printing Press” for a look into the origins of the printed word.
