Learn to Type Without Looking at the Keyboard

Most of us work in jobs that require us to have a good typing speed. Now, if you have to spend hours typing while looking at the keyboard and finding each letter, you are not going to be able to be productive at the real task at hand, your job.

As such, you must learn to type without looking at the keyboard, for the purpose of efficiency, productivity, and accuracy at your different typing jobs. Moreover, this may not be an incentive for all of you, but being able to type without looking at the keyboard is a very admirable quality that not many people possess.

There is a basic rule when it comes to learning how to type fast without looking at the keyboard, and that rule is to PRACTICE. This is not an art you can master overnight, so you are not allowed to get frustrated, lose patience, and give up. It takes a lot of effort, practice, and patience to learn this skill, so be prepared.

When you begin your endeavor, ensure that the position you are sitting in is comfortable for you. Sit at the right height, in a comfortable chair, and ensure that the keyboard is at a height where your hands are comfortable and your arms have the flexibility of spreading slightly. Start practicing on ergonomic keyboards in the QWERTY format.

Once you are comfortable, place your hands on the keyboard. Look closely at it. There are two bumps on the F and J keys, which are specifically designed to serve as guidelines to be able to type without looking.

Place the index finger of your left hand on the F key, and the index finger of your right hand on the J key. The rest of the fingers will automatically follow and be placed on the follow keys.

Finally, your hand placement should be like this: 4 fingers of the left hand, starting from the index finger on F and ending on A, and 4 fingers of the right hand starting from the index finger on J and ending on ; The thumbs of both the hands are used only to press the space key. Use whichever thumb you are comfortable with to press this key.

Your hands will set base in the aforementioned position. The remainder of the keys will be typed with these four fingers. The letters G and H that are in the central line, will be typed with the index fingers of the left and right hands respectively. The ' placed next to the ; in the central line will be typed by the little finger of the right hand.

The letters QWER will be typed with the same fingers that type ASDF respectively. The letters UIOP will be typed with the same fingers that type JKL; respectively. The letters T and Y will be typed by the index fingers of the left and right hand respectively.

Similarly, the letters on the lower line of letters ZXCV will be typed with the same fingers that are used to type ASDF respectively. On the right side, the letters NM,./, will be typed with the same fingers that are used to type JKL; respectively. The letter B will be typed with the index finger of the right hand.

The shift key on either side of the keyboard is to be typed with the little finger of either hand, depending on the letter you wish to type in upper case.Use the little finger of your right hand to press the backspace key.

The best way to start practicing, is by simply starting to type the letters of the central line only, until you are comfortable with it. Ensure that throughout this time, you are not looking at the keyboard. Concentrate, and try to type without errors, but if you do make errors don't feel let down.

Once you are comfortable with the central line, type the letters of the top line and finally, move on to the lower line and slowly type the keys without looking at the keyboard. A lot of people like to get started by being able to type their name without looking. Move on to basic words, and finally to simple sentence formation.

A sentence that enables the use of almost all the letters on the keyboard is 'the quick brown fox jumps over the lazy dog'. Keep practicing this sentence till you are able to master the art of typing without looking at the keyboard.

• An important tip is to type important events through the day, like the time you get up, the time you reached school/office, the things you have to do for homework/housework, etc.
• A lot of people have benefited from chat rooms, where they practice their typing skills while meeting new people. It is one of the most effective ways to learn how to type fast.

• Rewriting an excerpt from a newspaper article or a magazine is another way to give yourself daily practice techniques.
• If you make any errors while typing, try to correct them without looking at the keyboard. This will definitely take time, but will help you with your endeavors in the long run.

With these basic tips mastered, you can now have all your colleagues envy you, improve your average typing speed and marvel at the improvement in your performance at work.