Getting kids ready to type for on-screen tests

Why it matters more than it should

A child who types 8 words per minute spends most of a constructed-response item finding keys, not thinking. Research on computer-based writing assessments consistently finds a typing-fluency effect on scores. It isn't fair, but it's fixable — and it's fixable in months, not years.

Reasonable benchmarks

• Grade 2: knows home row, can type own name and short words with correct fingers. Speed doesn't matter.
• Grade 3: all letters by touch, ~10–15 WPM at high accuracy. Capitals and periods.
• Grade 4: ~15–20 WPM, sentences, numbers. Eyes on the screen most of the time.
• Grade 5: ~20–25 WPM, comfortable composing at the keyboard.

Accuracy above 95% at each stage matters more than the number — speed rises on its own once fingers stop searching.

The ten-minute routine

1. Warm-up (2 min): hands on home row, eyes up, a lap of the keys learned so far.
2. New keys or weak keys (5 min): one or two keys at a time, always reaching from home and coming back.
3. Fun lap (3 min): speed round on known keys — the reward for accuracy.

Do it four days a week for a semester and the test stops being a typing test.

Making it stick

Pin up a hand-position poster, colour a progress road, and hand out a certificate at home row, at all-letters, and at the finish. Kids will practise for a sticker; they'll practise more for a road they can see filling up. Bumpy Keys runs this exact routine as a daily quest, on iPad, with no accounts.