For my first post, I am going to explain a technique you can use to aid you in one of the more common tasks you might be faced with in an office environment - Touch-Typing. This is the process of typing something (such as a document) without having to look at the keyboard. I can hear you reading this and saying to yourself "I can't type without looking at the keyboard, I would never be able to do that!". Well, you can! Teaching yourself to touch-type is just a simple matter of training your fingers to locate the keys by position and it is much simpler than it sounds. Employers look in CV's for this skill too, meaning you might have a better chance of getting employed if you learn to touch type.
To keep everything in plain English, I'll give you a quick run down of the technique. First, you position the four fingers on your left hand on the A, S, D and F keys, and the four fingers on your right hand on the J, K, L and ; (semi-colon) keys. This is called your home row. By keeping your fingers on the home row and simply moving the nearest finger to the key you want to press, you'll quickly learn the location of all the keys on the keyboard and start to press them without looking.
Oh, and did I mention I'm using this technique to write my post? Yeah.
If you're thinking of giving this a go, then there is a wide range of software and websites available for you to try. A good place to start would be at http://www.typingweb.com/, it is a free, online typing tutor with tests, statistics, and more. Best of all, it is web-based, meaning it is free without any need to download or install anything. But if you want to learn how to type like a professional, you'll probably want to try the "Mavis Bacon Teaches Typing" series, which has been teaching since 1987. You can find their latest range of software here at http://tinyurl.com/bdfdwx. The website is American and advertises the software in United States Dollars, at $19.99. This is the equivilent of £13.60.
Simple, right? :D
JARGON-BUSTER (a quick run down of the stuff I explained)
- Touch-Typing: A method of typing quickly without looking at the keyboard
- CV: Curriculum Vitae, a profile of your personal information including education, employment, achievements and skills
- Home Row: The deafult position of fingers on a keyboard for people learning to touch-type
Remember - if I can do it, you can do it! ;)
- Gary Bird
- Volunteer
