When did you learn to type?

p_xavier

p_xavier

Authorized Fister
I'm baffled with some colleagues' skills. They don't know how to typewrite on a computer. It's 2025... Anyways I took a course in high school back in the 90s and the teacher physically injured us if we looked at our keyboard. Well it worked well since I type around 100 word a minute. Not the fastest but it gets the job done. What about you?
 
At work, in my early twenties. I got pretty fast, it was either that or be fired. Today I am a fiction writer so all those office years came in handy. On the contrary, I can't text on smartphones, it's frustratingly slow, so I download messaging apps and text on the laptop while I work.
 
I had to take typing classes in high school back in the 90's Chatting in AOL made me a typing pro compared to the rest of the class.

I'm too flabbergasted at the lack of typing skills my fellow co workers have when it comes to typing.
 
I was maybe 7 or 8 when my family brought home our first computer and I started learning programming and to type. I actually had like four years of "keyboarding" (as they called it back then), because I changed school districts before going to junior high - my original school district had keyboarding in fifth and sixth grade, and my school I transferred to did it in seventh and eighth.

Not only am I amazed that my co-workers (both young and old) can't type, but also that my kids both went through the school system here without ever having a class that taught the skill.
 
jshackles said:
I was maybe 7 or 8 when my family brought home our first computer and I started learning programming and to type. I actually had like four years of "keyboarding" (as they called it back then), because I changed school districts before going to junior high - my original school district had keyboarding in fifth and sixth grade, and my school I transferred to did it in seventh and eighth.

Not only am I amazed that my co-workers (both young and old) can't type, but also that my kids both went through the school system here without ever having a class that taught the skill.
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They still don't teach that as a core skill here. Ridiculous.
 
1998, when I got my first real PC, I was a teenager. I typed a lot and got pretty good at it.

About one week in I was already not looking at the keyboard anymore. It was fast.
 
Freshman year of high school.

I was actually a pretty fast typist but didn't type correctly with fingers on the home row (not 100% a "hunt and peck" typist but not too far off either). I remember being so frustrated over having to learn how to do it the right way because it massively slowed me down. But by the end of that semester, I was the fastest typist in the class and can now hit 120+ WPM at my top speed. My max before that was probably 60.
 
I'm still rocking the hunt and peck. Think I fell between the two stools of when kids would be trained to type on a typewriter as a possible vocation and computers being so prevelant that typing became a must have skill for everyone.
 
poppabk said:
I'm still rocking the hunt and peck. Think I fell between the two stools of when kids would be trained to type on a typewriter as a possible vocation and computers being so prevelant that typing became a must have skill for everyone.
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hunt and peck typos for the win!! :P
 
poppabk said:
That's not a typo - it's a saying. You did make me Google it though to make sure I didn't imagine it.
It is apparently almost a 700 year old saying though.
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Bugger me, has it ALWAYS been "between two STOOLS" and not "between two SCHOOLS"? Or did it change when stool became a term for literally shit. Or are they very similar, but slightly different, expressions?
 
The mid-90s PC gaming boom served as an unexpected educational catalyst for me. In my case, games like Age of Empires and Baldur's Gate provided a compelling incentive to learn English and develop technical proficiency. This learning path delivered a more durable and practical skill set than my education of that era.
 
Probably around later year of high school / start of university. I used to write game FAQs and I started doing some translations, so I needed to get faster at typing. I watched a few tutorials and went on from there.
 
8th grade, we had a computer lab at my school in East TN, so they started up a keyboarding class, and I ended up taking quite well to it. Suppose this would have been 2000-ish time frame.
 
1999 EverQuest: 10 WPM. Mostly yelling "TRAIN TO ZONE!" before dying.
2004 WOW: 20 WPM. Guild chat, loot drama, and arguing about DKP.
2010 Star Wars: TOR / Rift: 35 WPM. "Kindly" reiterating strategies mid-wipe.
2016 FFXIV: 50 WPM. Role-playing and building macros.
2020 to Now: 80 WPM office administrator for the third largest company in it's field.

Years of trash-talk, LFG spam, and meme-wars made these hands.
 
I learned to touch type freshman year of high school. (That was about 40 years ago.) One of the classes I took was literally a full year typing class. I have no idea how fast I type now. The thing is I'm a software engineer so it's helped me out a ton. That being said my impression is a large percentage of software engineers/programmers, maybe even most, can't touch type. I mean seriously it seems half the stuff that gets added to languages ends up being something to let you implement something with less typing. (Usually making the code way less readable. You'll see a ton of people chime in on LinkedIn how it's a greater feature and I'm so tempted to comment, "Would you just fucking learn to touch type? It'll help you in everything.")
 
grade 2 and 3. We used Apple and DOS and would run Where in The World is Carmen Sandiego? Among other classics.
That's the one I remember the most because I remember the teacher saying she felt it better stimulated minds.
Floppy discs, LOL!
 
Dirk Benedict said:
grade 2 and 3. We used Apple and DOS and would run Where in The World is Carmen Sandiego? Among other classics.
That's the one I remember the most because I remember the teacher saying she felt it better stimulated minds.
Floppy discs, LOL!
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That early? Damn you were lucky. Me it was in grade 12.
 
p_xavier said:
That early? Damn you were lucky. Me it was in grade 12.
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It was a niche thing, We had computer rooms back in the day, now they're all over. A computer room, today would be something of a redundancy.
Part of the school day would be inside of that room, so that you could get accustomed to using it as a means to take the skills into the real world.
They really did try to train us to be adults, when I was still going into school.
 
Poppinfresh said:
Same, except it was the 80s.

Entering BASIC programs in the classroom Apple II in 4th/5th grade really made me a fast typer.

Took "Keyborading" in 7th grade for a VERY easy A+
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I had a VIC 20 in the 80s but I didn't count it, because we had to program our own games.
 
In the late 80s early 90s, nothing special. At work so had to take picture
q0MQQeeXnllMhODz.jpg
 
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Only nerds and people who does that for a job learn how to type, it is way less common than you think.

Most people casually use computers for decades without ever learning.
 
  • Born in 1980
  • I did not pursue typing in middle school because they used typewriters - no thank you.
  • Started using the internet (rarely) in 1994. I was a two-finger-hunt-and-pecker for several years.
  • I bought my first PC after I graduated high school in 1998. I bought an ergonomic keyboard, trackball mouse, and a self teaching typing book as soon as I got the PC.
  • I spent about an hour a day working through the exercises to train myself for a month or two, then really pushed the skill by chatting on IRC and in forums.
  • By 1999 I was okay-ish. I still had to look at the keyboard while typing for several more years.
  • In 2002 I got a remote tech support job and had to take lots of ticket notes. That took my typing from probably 70wpm to 90+, and I had to learn quickly how to type while looking at the flow of text on my monitor instead of down at my keyboard.
Now I'm 45 and I have two teenage kids. They had some basic typing training via a virtual school program, but neither of them are great at it. It's something I need to push them on, but I don't think the message will get through until the really need to start typing a lot.
 
Also learned in the late 80s at home on my dos pc, and then a 90s typing class in school.

It's absolutely insane and professionally disqualifying to me when I see any adult look down at their hands at a computer... how can you reach adulthood and be so slow at the main interface for technology??

and if you haven't learned up, fire up an emulator or dosbox immediately and start playing these
MTT_manual_screenshot_3.jpg
totd-struggle-1.png
 
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Neve. Carnt yew tel?

In all honesty, probably when I first got a computer - would have been the spectrum.

People at work say I'm too fast - dunno if a compliment or not!!
 
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While I had learned my BASIC on Apple II Plus, and have owned MSX in 80s.... but I wasn't a good at it at all.
Father had a small word processor machine, which I used.. but very slow with two finger typing.
I learned proper typing technique in a typing class in 1990 in high school when I came to U.S - and come to think of it, it was one of the best skill that I learned from high school that has helped me in life.
 
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I type without looking at the keyboard, but don't do it the "proper way", probably only use 3 fingers or so. WPM is about 65 I think.
We did have typing class in elementary school where you learn the home row and all that, but it was only a few classes I think and I never type like that.
 
When in 6th grade they started teaching it from what I remember. That was around 1992-93. But my true skills didn't ramp up till I received my first computer in 1994. Helped a lot typing fast in MMO's. The best I tested for wpm was 140.
It makes me sad when people don't even know where the keys are on a keyboard and now with talk to speech they are even worse
 
We had a computer lesson once a week in the late 90's at school which kicked it off.
But what really grew my skill was the release of MSN Messenger.

I've had the same experience as you regarding people I work with. I type faster than 90% of everyone I work with and most of them are younger and grew up with computers as standard.
 
We typed in elementary but it was pretty basic. Really learnt in junior high. I didn't get "good" till my first job though.

I do remember seeing people type at hundreds of words a minute though, just crazy.
 
Self-taught in 8th or 9th grade (early '80s) because I was interested in computers and knew I'd be using a keyboard a lot. Also took a typing class in high school for the easy A.
 
I learned at the literal "typing" class we beginning in junior high, and I later took the elective all the way through senior year. We started on electric typewriters, and eventually moved to pcs/macs when the school upgraded, where we also learned various MS office applications, and generally just learned our way around PC's and macs. Little did I know back then I was probably learning the most vital skills that would affect my working life since. Seriously, lessons learned there were probably more relevant and valuable than anything I did in four years of college.
 
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