Any site for someone to use who needs to pass a typing test?

DDD

Well-Known Member
A difficult child friend of the family is trying to learn to type at home. She has to type 25 wpm to get hired at a call center. I am (or was) an outstanding typist but I took two years of typing in school. She stopped at the store today and told me she is using a stop watch and trying to learn how to type. Sigh. She didn't know that errors result in wpm adjustment etc.

Is there any web site that you guys have heard about where she could find guidance, practice tests etc.? I feel badly for her because she's going in blind. I have a 1950's typing book in my garage, lol, but I think something newer might help. Thanks. DDD
 

Malika

Well-Known Member
Something like this would be the ticket:

http://www.learn2type.com/

I learned to type years ago on a manual typewriter with all the keys covered with yellow plastic things - how well I recall the colour! - so that you couldn't see the letters. It was painfully tedious but now I type about 60 wpm and it's an incredibly useful skill.
 

Star*

call 911........call 911
I'm actually doing one now - that when you complete it - you get to print out a certificate - and I think that will look good attached to a resume. ALSO - and I was told this by my job coach at unemployment. ALL unemployment offices offer Mavis beacon typing classes for free. You just have to ask. I just like doing it at home TOO - for added practice so I don't get in the typing pool at unemployment and have a score under 95 wpm because ----one of the applications asked

typing wpm?
data entry wmp? Um.....isn't that the same as typing?
computer wpm? What wait a minute - isn't that technically data entry and that's typing? OMG Star you're showing your age.
spread sheet wpm? WTH? Spread sheet? Yeah I can do excell - I excell at excell (snort) - she wasn't amused. But now adays ALL kids EXCELL at excell (shot me down bang, bang)
and ten key strokes per minute? OMG are you kidding? they actually time you on that? I think last time I was timed it was 102....and short hand? WHY didn't you ask me shorthand? ROFLM elder A off.
 

donna723

Well-Known Member
Star, I think data wpm minute is doing lots of numbers and doing them very fast. I've been typing since I was a teenager, spent all my working days typing, and I never could do numbers without looking! Can you use one of those big ol' office calculators without looking, or use the number keypad on the side of your keyboard without looking?

I'm another one who learned to type in high school on old clunker manual typewriters with blank keys! We had a chart of the keys up on the board and we were supposed to look at that and not our hands. That was back in the days when we had to use carbon paper and typewriter erasers. I HATED that teacher! She would walk around the class and yell at us if our fingers weren't perfectly arched or our feet weren't flat on the floor or if she caught us looking at our hands! The ol' bat! She would probably be spinning in her grave if she could see me kicked back in the recliner with the laptop! When my son took it in school they called it "keyboarding" but that may have changed again by now. Some of the adult education programs teach it too. Once you have the basics down though, the rest is all practice practice practice to build up your speed.
 

InsaneCdn

Well-Known Member
typing wpm?
data entry wmp? Um.....isn't that the same as typing?
computer wpm? What wait a minute - isn't that technically data entry and that's typing? OMG Star you're showing your age.
spread sheet wpm?

Oh, Starbie...
These are all really different things.

Typing is... general purpose text, into some sort of formatter or output tool (typewriter is an output tool, Notepad or Word would be a formatter). What you are typing generally makes sense (depending on the writer, of course...), which makes for a certain flow of words. However, somebody who can type 95wpm on a typewriter, may NOT be able to do that into Word - and the opposite is definitely true! Typing speed needs to be qualified by what tool is being used.

Keyboarding is "usually" computerized typing... assumes the program is a text formatter of some sort, assumes spell-check etc. It is accurate and useful to be able to say that sombody's typing speed is 30wpm but their keyboarding speed is 65. Or whatever combo applies.

Data entry is filling out forms or other formatted data. If it is onto cardstock it is called keypunch (oh no, I'm revealing my age!). Data entry is very different from typing. The tab key gets worn out faster than anything else! You may have to remember codes, you will definitely have to remember the order of the fields and know how many tabs will get you to your next data element. I've known data entry clerks who could crash systems by overdriving the type-ahead memory... and same individuals couldn't type up a letter for the boss if their life depended on it. (and no, most secretaries cannot DO "data entry"... the two jobs are so totally different... unless they were specifically trained in both.)

Computer wpm and spreadsheet wpm are... garbage terms. You don't use spreadsheets for high-volume data entry, it's built for analysis, and I'm sorry, but analysis is NOT a high-speed task. Ever. "Computer" wpm is even worse... given that there's dozens of definitions for computer, just for starters... easy child? Ipad? unix box? big mainframe? etc. etc. etc. And then... are you working local on the computer using programs, or writing code, or running internet stuff, or...
 

DDD

Well-Known Member
Thanks. I just gave the two sites to her and am sure it will help. Donna, lol, I remember my typing teacher also...we must have been in the same class. Actually that would mean you were extremely gifted or I had been retained for six years or so.
:bigsmile:

I learned on an upright manual with covered keys. Ended up a typing whiz and then got hired for a job in a steno pool at a big law firm. They were so impressed by my wpm and then SIGH when I reported for work they had electric typewriters!
I'd never even seen one before. LOL! I used my normal typing touch and every letter repeated itself a zillion times on the page. :embarrassed:Yikes.

And yes I still remember typing specifications for my Dad's architectural office. An original and seven copies of each page with about fifty pages to the specs. Wow, these young whippersnappers have no idea how hard the good ole days were!
DDD
 

donna723

Well-Known Member
So DDD, do you remember the days before copiers? Or when there were copiers but they were the early models that didn't collate? Am I the only one who remembers doing multi-page projects where you had each page in a separate stack on a big table, then you had to walk round and round the table picking up pages to make a set? Aaaahh, the good ol' days!
 

KTMom91

Well-Known Member
Try Mavis Beacon Teaches Typing. I used Mavis Beacon when I was teaching adult school; it's a great program.
 

DDD

Well-Known Member
That's a funny question, Donna. Within the last two years I replaced my copy/fax machine and THEN for the first time I didn't have to sort. I was so shocked that it came thru sequentially. LOL DDD

On the other hand...do you remember "onion skin" paper used for copies so you could erase mistakes on all the xing copies? I wonder if they still manufacture that stuff? Sigh!
 

donna723

Well-Known Member
DDD, I remember the onion skin paper! And I remember having to use those stupid round typewriter erasers with the little brush on them, and trying to erase without making a hole in the paper. I'm old enough that when I took typing in high school, we learned how to cut stencils and use a mimeograph machine! I still remember how those mimeographed sheets smelled! We all loved that smell ... later on we learned why :wootsmiley: :wootsmiley::wootsmiley:! But I HATED typing in school! Or maybe I just hated that teacher! She was very tall and skinny, totally humorless, very prim, proper and straight-laced, and extremely religious to the point of being fanatical. And she insisted on grading on a curve, which meant that the two girls in the class who had been taking piano lessons since toddlerhood just blew the rest of us right out of the water!
 

Star*

call 911........call 911
Donna ---

I had the 300 lb typewriter with the interchangeable typeset ball - for pica or elite. AND Oh dear I had the old non-electric typerwiter too. ROFL at the "old bat" because yes, feet on the floor, fingers and hands perfectly arched. Which is where I am certain I got my schorching case of carpal tunnel syndrome from. I am so old I actually volunteered to stay after school in the business class and learn the first easy child to teach to the other students. I think it was 3.0. Mac. Yes I can blind 10 key......pretty well actually. (smirks at her accomplishment) lol.

D3 = Oh onion skin - I DO remember. I also remember having to run around and find one of those typing eraser pencils with the rubber tip on one end and the brush on the other - and do you remember the little cases with the correcto tape in them? How happy we needed no more liquid correction in a bottle!

and INsane.....Um.....I...WOW.......I .....Okay - I'm just saying......SO now I think what I can do - is type on a typewriter...and do something on a computer keyboard....and I can do a 10 key calculator.....and from what I gathered - that's it. I don't do code. I never did the other things....complete Greek to me. Thanks for the info- because NOW I know I have completely lied out my nose on a city application. ROFLMBO.
 

donna723

Well-Known Member
:hi5::yess::hapydancsmil:

Star, when we got our first electric typewriters at work, we thought we had died and gone to heaven! We had that kind too, the ones with the removable ball-thingies that came in different fonts. That was real high tech back then! They were HUGE, weren't they! And I remember the correction fluid and the little pieces of white tape that you stuck down there to get rid of the errors. The first time we got typewriters that actually had the correction key and the little rolls of sticky white tape down in there, we thought it was a miracle!

And you know, if you can use a 10-key at a decent speed without looking, you can do most data entry.
 
H

HaoZi

Guest
I might be younger, but I started on a manual and well remember the electrics with the different balls and the correction tape.
 

InsaneCdn

Well-Known Member
Now, now, Star, don't go feeling bad, very few get it right.
Once upon a time, when I was young, I was a code-writer.
In a shared office.
Now, I can't "type" to save my soul, can produce reasonable output on a computer but not "at speed", but... I can CODE.
So, we have two of us in this office, on the same project, working insane hours.
And every day there's a line-up of people outside the door, just listening... to our keyboards.
I did about 65-wpm-equivalent in code - stuff that comes directly out of my brain into the keyboard, no need to read, not typing for somebody else.
The other person in the room... did more like 95.
And it wasn't until the project was almost over that we even noticed the people lined up at the door...
I guess we were geeks back then.
<ROFL>

With your cross-section of skills? I'm surprised you don't go into something REALLY off-the-wall... like dispatch.
 

DDD

Well-Known Member
Haozi...what??????? LOL! That's crazy that you remember those olden days. I would have assumed that you were born after the changing head Selectrics were obsolete. Did you have a portable Underwood typewriter that you could carry around too?? What a versatile groups we are. Hugs DDD
 
H

HaoZi

Guest
My Dad had an old manual portable (with the red and black ribbon), and when I started writing he brought it out of the garage for me to learn on. State offices didn't get the latest and greatest, so the changing head typewriters I used were at his office. I did have a portable electric typewriter I got as a present but I think it was a Brother or Selectric or some such. ;)

ETA: Mom knew shorthand and her desk was full of fascinating things (to me as a kid) like stenographers notebooks, onionskin paper, carbon paper, those erasers with the brushes on the ends you mentioned (wish I could find those today, they're great for artwork, too).
 

Star*

call 911........call 911
I'm just thankful we're not using stone tablets and mallets....

I don't want to be stuck in an office -------I got a CDL to be in a truck.....lol. But with DF's disabilites? I need something local that lets me be home nightly - trust me...I'd like to have a home to come HOME to....lol.
He is not computer literate, can't text, is not electronically effecient and has NO desire to become proficient in ANY of the affore mentioned "vices". But for every imbalance there is a balance because if we had to plow a field with mules and figure the lb per foot of water pressure in a verticle pipe, or the board lengths per a log, or how many pounds of corn are in a bushel or how many bushels we could get in a truck or wagon - or how many days it takes to grow a pony? He could tell ya off the top of his head. Very smart man - just not of the digital age.

D3 - I sure hope your friend is able to get her job soon. It's really tough out there. And now the thing that I'm seeing when I'm reading job requirements are - YOU MUST NOT HAVE HAD MORE THAN THREE JOBS IN THE LAST THREE YEARS. I understand what that is about - because people are taking minumum wage jobs when their unemployment runs out just to get a job...and then like me - are either getting laid off, or getting fired - and it looks really bad on a resume. I mean lets make it a little more hard on people out there trying to get employment. That's the newest thing I've been up against. I mean how to you explain I had a manager that was jealous in words that don't make you sound like you were an immature twit?
 

InsaneCdn

Well-Known Member
I mean how to you explain I had a manager that was jealous in words that don't make you sound like you were an immature twit?
Post that as a separate thread so we can brainstorm?
Trust me, there ARE ways.
What you have to do is say absolutely NOTHING negative, but word it in such a way that the hiring party can read between the lines.

Sometimes, if your reference from there (or one of them at least) is really trustworthy, you can work in tandem... when they ask, just say something like "you would get far more details on that question from XXX, one of my references". Then they can ask HER, and... it didn't come from you. Know what I mean??

If you want to be close to home on a trucking job, though... not quite as easy to find.
Do you have to be on the ROAD? you could try for a yard-hand - shuttling trucks and trailers around all day, lots of parking (your favorite thing? or more practice?)
 

DDD

Well-Known Member
Haozi I totally understand the "fun" aspect of office materials. Like your Mom I was quite good in the steno arena (in fact I have found shorthand very very helpful raising the difficult child's because I could make notes during school meetings etc. and nobody but me knew what I recorded, lol) but as weird as it sounds I still get a kick out of paper, pencils, and especially pads and notebooks. I've been there done that with parenting for over fifty years but one of the things I miss is taking the kids shopping for school supplies and having family time while everyone got ready for the new year. There's just something so "hopeful" about the process. LOL. Even now if I feel overwhelmed by business pressure etc...I grab a fresh notebook to help clear my head and look for solutions. Thanks for sharing. Hugs DDD
 
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