This year brings a few changes.  Polk and Judson 5th grade students will still be exposed to keyboarding once a week for the school year in an "Introduction to Keyboarding."  Because they only have about 30 minutes of instruction a week, any additional practice they do at home will greatly improve their performance. They can loosely tape a piece of paper over their keyboard and put their hands underneath it so they are not tempted to look at the keys. Practice, practice, practice is the only way to really learn this important skill!

The Swift 6th grade keyboarding program is now part of Unified Arts.  Each student has keyboarding three times a week for a 9 week trimester.  For the remaining 3 weeks of the trimester they will take an enrichment technology class with Mr. Condit.  In addition, I will now have the 7th graders for an enrichment technology class for the three weeks after they complete a 9 week session of Exploratory Technologies with Mr. Condit.  In essence, Mr. Condit and I will switch students after 9 weeks of classes each trimester. We hope this will give all students exposure to a wide range of technology topics.

Just some notes relating to keyboarding: 
-Keyboarding is a skill that improves with practice. Any extra practice that you do at home really goes a long way toward improving keyboard skills.
-Keyboard speed is measured by WPM (words per minute). This is calculated by dividing the total number of characters and spaces you type by 5. A speed of 40 wpm is the basic minimum required by many employers and government positions. Does this mean that all of our students should be typing this fast? No! Effective typing speeds should be faster than your handwriting speed. The average 6th grader writes between 11 and 15 words a minute. So students need to set realistic goals for themselves and speed will come with practice.