Learn-to-type software / websites - what's good?

[Luigi Cicala]

Hello NYCISTk6,

It's been too long! I haven't posted in ages or attended a meet-up - I hope everyone is well and I look forward to seeing this group again soon!

In the meantime I am wondering if I could draw on the collected wisdom of this group about typing instruction software...I would love to learn of your successes!

During COVID we switched to having students at certain grade levels practice typing at home (instead of during a Technology class)

We decided to keep using our existing platform at that grade level to do this, which is www.TypeToLearn.com

I am curious what else is out there.

We're finding TypeToLearn is especially time-consuming for teachers to get a snapshot view of student progress / proficiency - who has been practicing every night, and who hasn't -and we haven't even tried to enable parents to do this from home yet.

Is anyone having a good experience with something else they could recommend?

Simply put all we need is:

1.) decent web-based typing instruction

2.) fast reporting to adults on student progress

3.) ideally, the ability to accommodate different ages in an age-appropriate way, so many grade levels could use the platform

thanks for any feedback here!

Luigi

--

Luigi Cicala

Art Teacher and Technology & Innovation Coordinator

The Brearley School - New York City

on Twitter <<@LuigiTeaching>>

[Robert Keith]

Hi Luigi -

We use Typing Pal with rising 3rd and 4th Grade students. 

Our primary issue with Type To Learn was the tedious length of the lessons. While it gave students a lot of practice, the amount of time that it took for students to advance seemed like overkill. We had the same issue with some of the other popular cloud-based Typing platforms. Typing Pal seemed like the most balanced, especially if students are going to use the skill fairly swiftly after learning it.

We share our admin login so teachers can check student progress. They can do a quick search (command/control F) and find students easily.

Typing Pal also works on every platform, although we request that if students use a tablet, they learn with a traditional keyboard. 

Rob

Trinity School

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Rob Keith
Trinity School EdTech Coordinator

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[Andy Greenspan]

Hi Luigi,

I also use Typing Pal. Very short lessons and a few games as well.

Andy

-- 

Andy Greenspan

Lower/Middle School Education Technology

The Ramaz School 

125 E. 85^th St. NY, NY 10028

(212) 774-8010

green...@ramaz.org

www.ramaz.org

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[Lan Heng]

Hi,

We used Type to Learn for many years but when I decided to use a full web version, I switched to Edutype. We have been using it for a number of years. Each year new features were added and I like many of the options and features in the program.  The web and technical support, as well as progress reports generated, are good, comprehensive, and useful. Beginning last year, we switched keyboarding course to start in the summer with incoming 4th grade or graduating 3rd grade and no longer teach keyboarding in fourth-grade technology class.

Lan Heng

Ethical Culture Fieldston School

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Lan Heng, Technology Teacher

Ethical Culture Fieldston School

33 Central Park West, NY 10023

(212) 712-6258

“Learning is experience. Everything else is just information.” ~ Albert Einstein

[Celeste Dorsey]

I love this thread, as I am pretty passionate about teaching my students this life skill :O)

For the longest time we used UltraKey, but the past few years, Typing.com. I have set up my classes and only recently paid so my 3rd graders don't see any advertisements while they are typing - it's next to nothing. Probably my favorite feature is where I create "Custom Lessons" specifically for each grade and their skills.

Happy to share more, email me directly if you like.

Hope everyone is well - I miss our group and am looking forward to when we do meet again, in person!

~Celeste

Lower School Technology
L R E I
Little Red School House & Elisabeth Irwin High School
272 Sixth Avenue
New York, NY 10014
212.477.5316

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[Luigi Cicala]

Wow thanks everyone for these thoughtful replies - I really appreciate it!

I look forward to checking out these other options.

It sounds like you mostly teach keyboarding at the 3rd and 4th grade level, is that right? I would love to hear more specifics about where keyboarding appears in the curriculum of your schools. 

We have influxes of new students at a few older grade levels, so I will be researching these other sites with that in mind too. 

Thanks again!

Luigi

[Judith Seidel]

Hi All,

When I first started teaching at Brearley in the 80's a techie parent told me that typing was unnecessary because of the imminent availability of voice recognition software. 

Well here we are more than 25 years later....

At Friends, homeroom teachers used to introduce our second graders to typing through the very playful Dance Mat Typing from BBC. It happened at the end of the year. Free. No saved student data but very appropriate for second grade. However it is flash based and doesn't work on iPads. We are not using any shared computers this year so we have abandoned Dance Mat for now. 

In Third and Fourth Grade our students have paid Typing Club School Accounts

Fully web based. Using it from the web on the iPad works better than using their app which is glitchy.

You can customize a whole series of lessons but you can't customize by individual child which I used to be able to do with Type to Learn

Though we don't use it much you can create your own lessons out of poetry or passages from books. Last year I wanted to add my own voice reading the poetry I had input. That was not an option.

The management features that I use on a regular basis work okay. To register my students I import their data as cvs files.

Students can also sign in through their Google Classroom, a feature which I might do next year.

Students like Typing Club, especially because they can get a lot of badges and there are games.

Their tech support is responsive.

When do I use Typing Club? I have, on purpose, very long tech classes of 60 or 70 minutes. Sometimes the students type for 10 or 15 minutes at the beginning of class and some homeroom teachers build typing time into their schedules.

I used Type to Learn for so many years that I sometimes find myself saying "Type to Learn" instead of "Typing Club." What I didn't like in the last flavor of Type to Learn I used was a new algorithm that determined how students advanced from one lesson to another. They seemed to be punished unnecessarily. Interestingly, the algorithm, or lack of it was much more gentle before the program got more "sophisticated" with some primitive form of AI.

This thread is making me want to check out Typing Pal and Typing.com. 

BTW - Celeste Dorsey is the best typing teacher I have ever met. 

I too miss our meetings and will work with Kim to set up another virtual one soon!

All the best,

Judith

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Judith Seidel

Lower School Technology Integrator

Computer Science Faculty

https://zoom.us/j/5475308185

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Friends Seminary

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[Luigi Cicala]

Thanks Judith - good to hear from you!

Your comments about the AI in TTL resonate: I've had to go in and manually update some student profiles depending on their rates of progress (re-casting some students into younger grades, others older grades) which seems to me like a real shortcoming of the software.

thanks again!

Luigi

[pross]

"When I first started teaching at Brearley in the 80's a techie parent told me that typing was unnecessary because of the imminent availability of voice recognition software. "

I don't think voice typing should be dismissed so easily. I have made my thoughts on this topic known before on this forum, so I'll be brief. I believe Google's Voice Typing tool is an effective way for students (or anyone) to create first drafts. After getting your thoughts out, you can go back and use the keyboard to edit and refine. This process may seem foreign to adults but students don't blink at it. You can use voice typing in the classroom if you have headphones with mics, no problem. 

Touch typing may still be with us (and may always be) but voice typing is a legitimate and effective way to put thoughts on a page.  It's not just an assistive technology anymore. 

:)

Peter R.

[Judith Seidel]

Dear Peter,

I agree with you and remember you excellent presentation at a NYCISTk6 meeting about the topic .  Sorry if I implied that voice recognition isn’t important and viable. It really is!

The advances came more slowly than that prescient Dad thought they would. Now that voice recognition is as good as it is we should employ it online our teaching. 

Also believe that once students have the typing basics they get much faster in environments they gravitate to naturally. So thanks for jumping in. I really appreciate it!

It can’t hurt to have both sets of skills.

Best,

Judith 

Sent from my iPhone

On Feb 5, 2021, at 10:07 AM, pross <pr...@cgps.org> wrote:

"When I first started teaching at Brearley in the 80's a techie parent told me that typing was unnecessary because of the imminent availability of voice recognition software. "

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[mr...@saintannsny.org]

Hi! We're using typingagent.com -- it hits your 1) web-based, and 3) many ages. Re 2) ...For admin, the results/stats are easy to see -- afraid I don't know whether parents have easy access to progress reports.

--Mike, Saint Ann's School

[Luigi Cicala]

Hi Peter - I think I saw you speak about Google Voice Typing a few years ago and meant to tell you that I did in fact start using it myself afterward - it's proven especially useful for crafting whatever I am going to say when giving a powerpoint presentation - so thank you!

The thing that bugs me about teaching keyboarding (and I am only doing this for the first time during COVID) is that QWERTY is itself this really inefficient layout that we are all forced to conform to...back when I had an Apple IIgs as a kid I used to pry off the keys on the keyboard and re-layout them in the Dvorak system...and now it just feels like it would be nuts to do that again...

have a good weekend everyone, and thanks again for your feedback!

Luigi

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