How to improve your typing test WPM

Typing skills, word processing or keyboarding skills as they are now commonly known is a skill which takes time, perseverance and training to achieve. It is not something that can be learned in a few hours, it takes regular practice and patience. As you learn to type, you can start to test your typing speed. Learn more in this article.

Learning to type

Touch typing can be learned relatively easily. To teach yourself how to type, you firstly need to know the location of the keys on a keyboard. Begin by printing a copy of the keyboard, and cover up the letters on the keys of your keyboard. Using the 'Home' keys, the right four fingers on keys 'asdf' and the left four fingers on keys 'jkl', begin by typing some simple words, and as you progress you can start typing longer words, and eventually, sentences. Copy from printed material, books, newspapers, etc to build your speed and accuracy. It is when you reach this stage that you can start to test your WPM. When you are just beginning however, your typing speed may only be 10 -15 words a minute, but with lots of practice, you could reach speeds of up to 100 WPM.

Where to train

If you would like to learn how to touch type effectively, you can undertake typing courses online or in a classroom environment. There are a variety of courses and typing classes which teach you how to learn typing. Pitman Training Pitman Training offer a comprehensive typing course which teaches you the basics and helps you to build up your speed through specific exercises and speed tests. Learning how to type is a skill which is well worth learning. If you work in an office environment and your job requires you to type lengthy documents such as reports or policies, you can improve efficiency and tasks are completed in half the time. The more you practice your skills, the faster you will become. You will also become a more efficient typist. If you work as a secretary, and you are required to take minutes, being able to type at a reasonable speed means that you would be able to type up the minutes during the meeting on a laptop computer.