Typing Toward Triump: Empowering Dyslexic Learners Through Keyboard Mastery

Typing isn’t just a practical skill—it can be life changing for dyslexic students! In this episode, I break down why learning to type can remove barriers, boost confidence, and even reinforce reading and spelling skills.

I’ll share my personal experience diving into touch typing (spoiler: it’s not as easy as it looks!) and the fascinating science behind why typing activates key areas of the brain that support literacy. Plus, I’ll explore some of the best typing programs out there—what works, what doesn’t, and how to help your child build this essential skill the right way.

If you’ve ever wondered whether typing is worth the effort for your dyslexic learner, this episode is for you! Let’s rethink how we teach writing and give our students a tool they can use for life.

🔹 The connection between typing, reading, and spelling

🔹 Why traditional keyboarding classes don’t work for dyslexic students

🔹 How to introduce typing the right way (accuracy before speed!)

🔹 The best programs for dyslexic learners—Typing.com, TypingClub, and TTRS

Tune in and let’s unlock a new way to support our students! 🎧✨

Thank you for listening to Dyslexia Decoded! Remember, every journey begins with a single step, and progress always beats perfection.

Subscribe so you never miss an episode, and if you found this story inspiring, please share it with someone who might need to hear it.

Until next time, stay strong, stay curious, and stay fearless. 💚

Transcript

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Hey there and welcome back to Dyslexia Decoded with teacher Maggie. Today I wanna dive into a topic that I feel like is not covered enough when it comes to all the research and the resources that are out there for dyslexic parents to is about typing skills. Can be to a dyslexic student, not just knowing how to type, but all of the things that will benefit their brain when it comes to literacy and organization. I went on a deep dive into this topic and I'm really excited to share it with you. So it's the coolest part of having a podcast. It's like finding things that I'm super excited to share with the whole world, You know, maybe I don't reach the whole world, but those of you who are listening, I appreciate you so much I'm really excited to share today's episode. I have to admit myself, I am not a very good keyboardist. I've always been the peck with two fingers kind of person, and it's worked out well enough. But recently I've been wanting to learn how to code. there's so many educational games out There that are really cool and I use 'em in my tutoring, but there's always things I wanna change I'm like, oh, I could do this better. And then I think, no, I can't do it better because I don't know how to code. Cliff Wiseman is saying anyone that owns their own business should know how to code. 'cause if you're gonna hire people to code, then you need to be able to check the work and stuff. he inspires me anyway. So anything. Cliff Wiseman says to do, I would probably do I wanna learn to code. And, something that will make coding a lot easier is having efficient keyboarding skills. So that's what led me in this direction. And then, it just has spiraled ever since. I'm really excited to share everything I've learned. I started practicing on typing.com and it was really interesting to me as I was typing, it felt so similar to the same parts of my brain. The same way my brain works when I'm writing and when I'm spelling. I could sense my brain engaging in a way that was just so clearly. The dyslexic parts of my brain were, were strongly engaged the entire time. so this observation led me to wanna explore more into the science. behind typing and dyslexia and discover some compelling insights. It's really cool to see how these things are related, so why typing helps a dyslexic brain. Learning to type isn't just a useful skill. for anyone, but for a dyslexic student, it can be a transformative tool. It can, reduce the strain on handwriting. as a reading tutor that when a student is writing their letters, writing 'em correctly is just going to encourage their reading as well. So for example, you write from top to bottom, left to right, we read top to bottom, left to right. Students have the habit of writing from the bottom up. They're working backwards when they're trying to read down and write up. It's like swimming upstream and it is really going to hinder their. Developing fluency, I see it over and over again and, there's research behind it and I believe it. So I really encourage students to write top, to bottom, left to right. But when a student is trying to think of all these things at once, how to write the letters, how to correctly format letters, having correct spacing, using correct spelling. All of these things can really hinder a student's. Writing fluency the ability to express themselves around creativity. Learning to type can reduce the strain of just general handwriting. It will reinforce spelling and reading. Fluency. Typing involves muscle memory repeatedly. Typing words helps fingers internalize spelling patterns Very much like how practicing sight words enhances recognition. research indicates that typing can strengthen phonic skills and helping improve spelling, hand reading fluency. the third thing is that this kind of links to the first, that when you're typing, it's gonna just reduce that cognitive. Load reading and spelling makes our brains tired. There's so many things that when we're working against our dyslexia, it's not how our brain wants to work. It is just so much more physically taxing than it is for someone without dyslexia, I guess I should say. So being able to type is gonna lessen that mental load. We're not gonna have to put all that energy into letter formation or even spelling 'cause hey, hallelujah. For spell correct. Right. Spell check sentence construction. if we write a sentence, it doesn't sound right. It's easy to just go back and fix it. So there's just so much that we're juggling when we're writing and being able to type just simplifies these tasks. Once typing becomes second nature, students can really concentrate more on their ideas rather than the mechanics of writing. And the last thing I wanna mention here is that when you're typing, you're using your left, handing your right hand, and in turn you're using both sides of the brain. Anytime you're doing an activity where you're using both sides, activating both hemispheres in the brain. This can enhance your neural connections, improving coordination and processing speed. It's like a mental workout every time you type. as I was thinking about typing, I couldn't help but make these connections a journey of learning to type will closely parallel the process of learning to read, especially when you're learning to read through structured phonics approaches. As you introduce a few letters and a vowel, they can blend those and we have more letters, and you add other phonics patterns and gradually increase knowledge students build proficiency step by step. This structured progression is particularly beneficial for dyslexic learnings. While when you're learning the type, it's the same way you're gonna start with just. Two keys, you're a nice little F in your J and you're gonna gradually add another letter or finger stroke the same way we embrace mistakes when learning how to read. You will embrace mistakes when you're learning how to type. it is a whole mindset. That we need to develop in our students that it's okay to make mistakes. do something wrong learn from it and try again. the most important thing is that we're moving forward and continuously practicing. when you're typing, even me, as I'm doing my typing programs, I get plenty of red letters. My goal isn't to have it perfect. My goal is to get a little better than I was the last time I practiced. And gradual development of fluency. When we say fluency, we mean smoothness and speed words per minute are tracked in both typing and reading, but our focus doesn't have to be on being the fastest reader or the fastest typer right away. Typing fluency, just like reading fluency develops over time. with practice typing, speed will increase naturally as accuracy and confidence grows. So emphasizing accuracy before speed will ensure a very solid foundation, and both reading and typing. So look at some of the science behind typing in the brain. Several studies highlight the cognitive benefits of typing for dyslexic individuals, typing reinforces phonics and spelling, touch typing programs, especially those incorporating phonics can enhance spelling by associating finger movements with specific letters and sounds. Typing reinforces the neural pathways involved in reading and spelling. We're turning reading and spelling more into a kinesthetic activity where we're not just seeing the words and hearing the words. We're touching them. Typing will also activate the language processing centers in the brain while handwriting engages more of these centers, a broader brain network. typing will still stimulate areas related to language processing. this engagement supports the development of literacy skills typing improves organization and executive functioning, A lot of people don't realize that organization is something that dyslexic struggle with, and it could be. Organizing our writing, keeping our numbers in order when we're doing math. It could also be keeping our room tidy or knowing where that homework assignment is. All of these things can come into play with dyslexia and the way our brain works when we're typing. it will help to improve these organizational parts of our brain. So I wanted to share with you some of the typing programs that I have looked into and my specific thoughts on them. first, I already mentioned right now I'm using typing.com. I just went to typing.com 'cause it's what I've always used. And I'm familiar with it and it's free. The free version is completely adequate. there are ads, but they're kind of to the side. They're nodding your face, they don't, I don't even notice them. So I am been using typing.com myself, but I wanted to look into, I love when I'm listening to a podcast. And they give me the deets. I don't have to go research for myself. So I wanted to share with you a little bit more. So they do have an ad free, their premium version, and it's 3 99 a month. It takes the ads away, but they also have other things involved. One of those is a coding program, which is me. Super intrigued. I wanna check that out. I'm really tempted to sign up for premium typing just for that. Computer safety things being a good digital citizenship, I believe they call it. and other typing programs that are involved in having a premium membership. I also tried out typing club. Actually being in their lessons I thought was pretty cool. I really enjoyed the lessons and just kind of the way. The keystrokes and stuff, and the screen was laid out. They have more games kind of built in, and I found those really engaging. But if you are going onto their free version, their ads are everywhere. I felt they were really obnoxious. Sometimes there was ads coming from the top and from the bottom, and they were covering up where I was trying to click, and I was really frustrated with it. So unless you are wanting to, invest and use their ad-free experience. I kind of wouldn't recommend it, but to get an ad free, so I mentioned the typing.com was 3 99 a month, And it's per month, month to month. You don't need to commit to the year and pay the whole year up front. typing club, if you want to go month to month, it's eight 50 a month. And if you want to pay. For the whole year, then it's only $35 for the year. I think that they said it was like 2 92 a month, so that's pretty reasonable. I do prefer to do things month to month because if I decide to stop doing it, I don't wanna pay for whole year and then you know that next year auto renews and you forgot. So those are just my honest thoughts on typing.com and typing. Typing. Club. Another one you might wanna look into. I was trying to research it, but they made me put in my email and they said they were gonna send me a demo and. They haven't yet. So I'm really interested to learn more about touch type, read and spell. this is a typing program made for dyslexic students. some of the feedback on it is that it could be kind of boring and dry, which may affect motivations. So that kind of makes me lean away, but. It is touch typing and phonics like Orton-Gillingham aligned, I wanna research this more. I do plan to have a future episode where I go over lots of different technologies that are available to support dyslexia. I know I always mention in my episodes what I wanna do in the future, and sometimes I get to the things, sometimes I don't. If I don't send me a message, hit me up and let me know, like, Hey, I'm really waiting for this and I will totally get on top of it. So let's talk about the right approach to teaching. Typing there is a right way and a wrong way. it makes me think back to my very own high school keyboarding class my mom who's not dyslexic was a really fast keyboarder. She was really proud of this skill, her whole life. They got her jobs and all of that. 'cause that was a very important skill for a long, long time. I took keyboarding in high school and in the beginning it was fun. I was keeping up, we were learning our keys, strokes. But once we've learned all the keys, the whole focus became on increasing words per minute. And there was these graphs and we were compared to everyone in the class. even though I was trying. I was always down at the bottom with the kids who weren't trying. So eventually I just stopped trying. my keyboarding skills never progressed very far because anything like this takes practice and practice was discouraging when I kept seeing myself at the bottom of the list. I feel like this is another warning for teaching, reading. the students, come to school excited, wanting to learn, learning their letters and sounds, they're right there with the rest of their. Class until they're not, until the students start to move ahead beyond them. I should probably record this 'cause I talk with my hands a lot until the other students move ahead and they feel left behind and they're trying and they're trying, but they're just not even close. And it could get really discouraging. And many times these students, eventually give up especially if they don't know they have dyslexia, if their schools dunno, they have dyslexia. If their teacher thinks that they're not trying or they're being lazy, or if you would just focus or put in effort, then you could read the word Things like this Will produce a student who just shuts down and cannot put any mental energy into learning to read. And that's what happened to me with learning to type. So when teaching, reading, prioritize accuracy. Gradual progress. Is the way to go. I love these structured programs. I do feel like typing.com moves a little slower in their progression and introduction of keys than typing Club did. So I would maybe prefer that. and then just keep a positive reinforcement and celebrating every little win. So I hope by now I've talked you into starting yourself or your dyslexic student to learning typing. Now, please know when they start, it is going to be more challenging for them than it would be for a student without dyslexia. I think it's fair to be honest with them. Like, Hey, we're gonna do this. It's not gonna be easy. You're gonna make a lot of mistakes, but we can do anything for like 10 minutes, right? If you could do 10 minutes a day, you will make. Mind boggling progress over the next few weeks. So I recommend starting nice and young. even before you know they have dyslexia, I started my 5-year-old on typing.com. She's loving it. Is she perfect to know? But she is getting familiar with the keyboard and is really enjoying. The process of learning. And that's what we should always encourage students to enjoy the learning process, not just the goal of mastering something. choose a structured typing program like typing.com or typing club, and there's probably so many, many, many more out there. Those are just the ones I know. Incorporate some more enjoyable elements. There are more gamified typing programs and websites you can look into. emphasize accuracy over speed. Our goal isn't to be the fastest typer. It's to get the right letters and the speed will come. Help your student be patient with themselves and just enjoy the process. So my final thoughts, I firmly believe that learning the type is one of the most empowering tools we can offer dyslexic students. It not only enhances writing capabilities, but also boosts confidence and self-expression by reducing the barriers associated with handwriting and spelling. Typing enables students to articulate their thoughts more freely. Given the research in my personal observations, it's evident that typing reinforces many of the same skills involved in reading and writing. Therefore, I personally advocate for incorporating, typing instruction into the learning process for all dyslexic students. If you haven't yet considered typing as a tool for your child, I encourage you to explore this option. It may have a more profound impact than you anticipate. Thank you for joining me on this episode of Dyslexia Decoded with Teacher. Maggie. If you found this discussion insightful, please share it with other parents or educators who might benefit. I am eager to hear about your experiences. If your child is learning let me know how it's going. If you look down in the description of the episode, there should be a link to message me directly. Now, some of you know I have. Been on this podcast since January. I went to start in September, procrastination, fear, all of the things. But I hesitated to start and I started in January. So it's been three-ish months now, and and I've been pretty consistent getting an episode out weekly this week. It took me a little longer to find something I was really excited about, and I'm excited to share something that means something to me and isn't just what I think you wanna hear, I did get my first email from Laura, so I wanted to say hi to Laura and her son. congratulations on your dyslexia diagnosis, and if you or any of the listeners need anything, please reach out to me. I do this because I want to connect with you. So until next time, friends, keep going slow and trust the process. Bye-bye.